Sky News said in a post on X that the Bondi stabbings were a “suspected radical Islamic” terrorist attack before it was confirmed the attacker was not a Muslim. A subsequent post from Sky then referred to a “mentally ill man” who “accidentally” caused multiple fatalities.
These are not genuine screenshots. Sky News shared no such posts.
Fake screenshots supposedly showing social media posts from Sky News in the aftermath of the Bondi attack are circulating online. But the news organisation shared no such posts.
An attacker killed six people at a mass stabbing at a shopping centre in Bondi Junction, Sydney, on 13 April. A baby injured in the attack was discharged from hospital on 21 April, while a further five people appear to still be in hospital at the time of writing. Australian authorities are not treating the attack as an act of terrorism, and have said the attacker had mental health problems.
The image going viral compares two posts appearing to be from the verified account of Sky News on X (formerly Twitter).
Text in the graphic says “News Headlines of an attack when the suspect is still unidentified” and then presents what appears to be a post on X from Sky News saying “BREAKING: Shots Fired in Public Area; Suspected Radical Islamic Jihadi Muslim Terrorist Attack Underway”.
More text says: “After the suspect is identified as not being Muslim” and then presents what looks like another Sky News post saying “Tragic Incident: Mentally III Man Accidentally Causes Multiple Fatalities in Public Shooting.” Both of the alleged Sky News posts incorrectly refer to a shooting, rather than a stabbing.
The image has been shared on both X and Facebook with the caption: “Look how quick the mainstream media changed their narrative when they realised the terrorist in Bondi wasn’t a Muslim”. Another post says: “How the media brainwash people and cause hatred amongst communities”.
However, these are not genuine screenshots—Sky News told Full Fact that these posts are not from the organisation.
Head of Digital Output at Sky News, Nick Sutton, replied to a post sharing the screenshots saying: “I’m not sure where you got these screenshots from. But they are not genuine Sky News tweets about the Sydney attack”. He shared a list of the outlet’s published posts on X on 13 April, which included no such posts.
Full Fact could find no evidence that these posts were ever shared by the news organisation.
Misinformation can spread quickly during large scale news events and it’s important to verify information shared on social media with official sources. We’ve also written about a viral claim misidentifying the attacker as a 20-year-old Sydney student.
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Image courtesy of Whats new? |
This article is part of our work fact checking potentially false pictures, videos and stories on Facebook. You can read more about this—and find out how to report Facebook content—here. For the purposes of that scheme, we’ve rated this claim as false because these are not genuine screenshots and Sky News has not shared these posts.
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