''The Exposé'' (formerly known as ''The Daily Exposé'') is a British conspiracist and

fake news website Fake news websites (also referred to as hoax news websites) are websites on the Internet that deliberately publish fake news—hoaxes, propaganda, and disinformation purporting to be news, real news—often using social media to drive web traffic ...

created in 2020 by Jonathan Allen-Walker. It is known for publishing

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. In January 2020, the disease spread worldwide, resulting in the COVID-19 pandemic. The symptoms of COVID‑19 can vary but often include fever ...

and anti-vaccine misinformation. The website became known internationally after Brazilian president

Jair Bolsonaro Jair Messias Bolsonaro (; born 21 March 1955) is a Brazilian politician and former military officer who served as the 38th president of Brazil from 2019 to 2023. He previously served as a member of Brazil's Chamber of Deputies (Brazil), Chamb ...

cited one of its articles in a speech falsely claiming that

COVID-19 vaccine A COVID19 vaccine is a vaccine intended to provide acquired immunity against severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the virus that causes coronavirus disease 2019 ( COVID19). Knowledge about the structure and fun ...

s could cause

AIDS The HIV, human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) is a retrovirus that attacks the immune system. Without treatment, it can lead to a spectrum of conditions including acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). It is a Preventive healthcare, pr ...

, and after

Chinese state media The mass media in the People's Republic of China primarily consists of television, newspapers, radio, and magazines. Since the start of the 21st century, the Internet has also emerged as an important form of mass media and is under the direct ...

outlets republished one of its articles which falsely claimed that

was created by

Moderna Moderna, Inc. ( ) is an American pharmaceutical and biotechnology company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, that focuses on RNA therapeutics, primarily mRNA vaccines. These vaccines use a copy of a molecule called messenger RNA (mRNA) to carry inst ...

History

''The Exposé'' was created in November 2020 by Jonathan Allen-Walker, a

welder A welder is a person or equipment that fuses materials together. The term welder refers to the operator, the machine is referred to as the welding power supply. The materials to be joined can be metals (such as steel, aluminum, brass, stainles ...

from

Scunthorpe Scunthorpe () is an industrial town in Lincolnshire, England, and the county's third most populous settlement after Lincoln, England, Lincoln and Grimsby, with a population of 81,286 in 2021. It is the administrative centre and largest settleme ...

Lincolnshire Lincolnshire (), abbreviated ''Lincs'', is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the East Midlands and Yorkshire and the Humber regions of England. It is bordered by the East Riding of Yorkshire across the Humber estuary to th ...

. In March 2021,

Twitter Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...

suspended the site's main account, but it created several alt accounts to evade its ban. Following its second ban, the site relied on pairs of alt accounts to avoid losing all of its followers or the ability to tweet, and accused Twitter of

censorship Censorship is the suppression of speech, public communication, or other information. This may be done on the basis that such material is considered objectionable, harmful, sensitive, or "inconvenient". Censorship can be conducted by governmen ...

. As of July 2021, two of the site's alt accounts had approximately 14,000 and 18,000 followers respectively, with 65% of the site's referrals coming from Twitter. As of March 2023, the site's main account had approximately 5,600 followers.

Content

Ernie Piper of Logically, a British anti-

disinformation Disinformation is misleading content deliberately spread to deceive people, or to secure economic or political gain and which may cause public harm. Disinformation is an orchestrated adversarial activity in which actors employ strategic dece ...

research organisation, said that ''The Exposé'' "was unique both for producing a high volume of original content" and for " ryingto make it look like they were doing hard-hitting

investigative journalism Investigative journalism is a form of journalism in which reporters deeply investigate a single topic of interest, such as serious crimes, racial injustice, political corruption, or corporate wrongdoing. An investigative journalist may spend m ...

" instead of "twisting the facts to suit

conspiracy theories A conspiracy theory is an explanation for an event or situation that asserts the existence of a conspiracy (generally by powerful sinister groups, often political in motivation), when other explanations are more probable.Additional sources: * ...

." Piper wrote in July 2021 that the website "has promoted a standard portfolio of COVID-denialist, anti-vaxxer, and Great Reset myths framed as breaking news" since its establishment, noting that the site's writers "often distort or misinterpret the information within the snapshots of the documents they use to push a number of conspiratorial narratives". The website has interviewed fringe figures such as anti-vaccine activist Michael Yeadon.

COVID-19 misinformation

''The Exposé'' has falsely linked the

s to

miscarriage Miscarriage, also known in medical terms as a spontaneous abortion, is an end to pregnancy resulting in the loss and expulsion of an embryo or fetus from the womb before it can fetal viability, survive independently. Miscarriage before 6 weeks ...

monkeypox Mpox (, ; formerly known as monkeypox) is an infectious viral disease that can occur in humans and other animals. Symptoms include a rash that forms blisters and then crusts over, fever, and lymphadenopathy, swollen lymph nodes. The illness ...

and

hepatitis Hepatitis is inflammation of the liver parenchyma, liver tissue. Some people or animals with hepatitis have no symptoms, whereas others develop yellow discoloration of the skin and whites of the eyes (jaundice), Anorexia (symptom), poor appetite ...

. The website has also downplayed the number of deaths due to COVID-19 in the United Kingdom and falsely claimed that the vaccines are causing mass deaths. In June 2021, ''The Exposé'' falsely claimed that

Public Health England Public Health England (PHE) was an executive agency of the Department of Health and Social Care in England which began operating on 1 April 2013 to protect and improve health and wellbeing and reduce health inequalities. Its formation came as a ...

(PHE) data proved that more vaccinated people were dying due to COVID-19 than unvaccinated people. The website's claim was debunked by the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

Full Fact Full Fact is a British charity, based in London, which checks and corrects facts reported in the news as well as claims which circulate on social media. History and structure Full Fact was founded in 2009 by businessman Michael Samuel, the ...

and

Reuters Reuters ( ) is a news agency owned by Thomson Reuters. It employs around 2,500 journalists and 600 photojournalists in about 200 locations worldwide writing in 16 languages. Reuters is one of the largest news agencies in the world. The agency ...

. The claim was later cited in a

Sky News Australia Sky News Australia is an Australian news channel owned by News Corp Australia. Originally launched on 19 February 1996, it broadcasts rolling news coverage throughout the day, while its prime time lineup is dedicated to opinion-based programs fe ...

broadcast by host Alan Jones and politician

Craig Kelly Craig Kelly (born 29 September 1963) is an Australian conservative politician who represented the division of Hughes as a Liberal Party (and later United Australia Party) MP from 2010 until his defeat at the 2022 federal election. Kelly in ...

; Sky News Australia subsequently removed the broadcast and issued a correction on its website. In October 2021, ''The Exposé'' used data published by the

UK Health Security Agency The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) is a government agency responsible for all health security in England, and some reserved public health protection matters across the whole of the United Kingdom. It is an executive agency of the Department ...

(UKHSA), which misleadingly indicated that COVID-19 infection rates were higher among fully-vaccinated than unvaccinated people, to falsely claim in several articles that the vaccines were not only ineffective but were also causing vaccinated people to develop AIDS "much faster than anticipated". The articles were widely shared on social media across the world, and one such article was cited by Before It's News, a

, which was subsequently used as a source by Brazilian president

in a speech. The video of Bolsonaro's speech was removed from

Facebook Facebook is a social media and social networking service owned by the American technology conglomerate Meta Platforms, Meta. Created in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with four other Harvard College students and roommates, Eduardo Saverin, Andre ...

Instagram Instagram is an American photo sharing, photo and Short-form content, short-form video sharing social networking service owned by Meta Platforms. It allows users to upload media that can be edited with Social media camera filter, filters, be ...

and

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

for violating their policies regarding COVID-19 vaccines. In March 2022, ''The Exposé'' falsely claimed that a study proved "beyond a reasonable doubt" that COVID-19 had been created by

. The study, which was published in the '' Frontiers in Virology'' research journal, said that Moderna had patented a 19 nucleotide genetic sequence uniquely matching a part of the

SARS-CoV-2 Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS‑CoV‑2) is a strain of coronavirus that causes COVID-19, the respiratory illness responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic. The virus previously had the Novel coronavirus, provisional nam ...

spike protein three years prior to the pandemic, arguing it was evidence that the virus was manufactured as part of a lab leak conspiracy. The study has been widely derided for its misunderstanding of statistical likelihood, particularly as the 19 nucleotide sequence is not unique to SARS-CoV-2, and is also found in organisms like bacteria and birds. ''The Exposé'''s article was republished by

outlets, including ''

China Daily ''China Daily'' ( zh, s=中国日报, p=Zhōngguó Rìbào) is an English-language daily newspaper owned by the Central Propaganda Department of the Chinese Communist Party. Overview ''China Daily'' has the widest print circulation of any ...

'' and ''

Global Times The ''Global Times'' is a daily Chinese Tabloid (newspaper format), tabloid under the auspices of the Chinese Communist Party's flagship newspaper, the ''People's Daily'', commenting on international issues from a Chinese nationalistic pers ...

,'' and was shared on Twitter by a counselor for the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs' Department of Information. In July 2022, ''The Exposé'' posted a graph indicating that 94% of deaths due to COVID-19 in England between April 1 and May 31 were among those who were vaccinated. The graph was widely shared on social media. Reuters and Lead Stories found that the statistic by itself was misleading as it failed to acknowledge the country's vaccination rate. In September 2022, ''The Exposé'' falsely claimed that the COVID-19 vaccines contain graphene oxide.

Operation

Ernie Piper of Logically wrote in July 2021 that the website's finances and number of contributors, and whether it had permanent staff besides Allen-Walker, were "unclear". The website has run monthly fundraising campaigns since February 2021 on its home page, Twitter and

Telegram Telegraphy is the long-distance transmission of messages where the sender uses symbolic codes, known to the recipient, rather than a physical exchange of an object bearing the message. Thus flag semaphore is a method of telegraphy, whereas pi ...

, with sporadic campaigns on other platforms such as Buy Me a Coffee and

GoFundMe GoFundMe is an American for-profit crowdfunding platform that allows people to raise money for events ranging from life events such as celebrations and graduations to challenging circumstances like accidents and illnesses. From 2010 to the ...

References

External links