Haiti: False rumors on the Twittersphere

Posted By Joshua Keating Thursday, January 14, 2010 - 2:53 PM Share

Twitter users may have noticed the trending topic "UPS is shipping to" on their side rails. The topic consists almost entirely of the re-tweeted message:

UPS is shipping to Haiti for free today UNDER 50 POUNDS- Clothing and Food Drives at all United Way and Salvation Army

This is not true:

In a blog post Wednesday on UPS's Web site, a spokeswoman debunked the rumor and said that destruction of Haiti's roads and communications networks "means our own shipping services to Haiti are on hold."

UPS is donating $1 million to help the people of Haiti through relief agencies, she said.

There were similar rumors last night about American Airlines and JetBlue flying doctors to Haiti for free and both airlines were flooded with calls as a result.

My colleague Evgeny Morozov wrote about Twitter's power to misinform during the swine flue epidemic, and with a few exceptions, the noise to signal ratio seems particularly high during this crisis.

EXPLORE:HAITI'S DISASTER, INTERNET

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January 15, 2010

Hope that all Haitians can

Hope that all Haitians can safely weather the storm?Peoples of the world care about you?Bless you
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