'Momo' may be 'dead,' but experts say avoiding the next hoax is up to us
[...] So how did we get here? How did this apparent hoax, now just the latest fodder for internet memes, wind up causing panic among parents in countries from India to Colombia, from the UK to the United States, and from the Houses of Parliament to U.S. police agencies?
[...] Laura Hazard Owen, deputy editor of Harvard's Nieman Journalism Lab, called the "Momo challenge" phenomenon "the most fascinating/unique fake news story I've covered in awhile." The problem, she said, was that most of the news stories warning people about "Momo" appeared to be based on hearsay. One local news station, she pointed out, "simply interviewed a 5-year-old," while others ran with anecdotes from parents who had heard from their child that they had heard from another child... you get the point.
[...] "Unless you can watch all media, TV and news, consciously, step back from it, get a little distance and ask yourself what's being said, you're going to be taken in," Dr. Mramor argued. "It's like when you're watching a scary movie and get sucked into the plot... be a conscious consumer," she said. "And if more people were, this would never have happened. We wouldn't even be talking about this story."
(Score: 3, Interesting) by bradley13 on Wednesday March 13 2019, @02:11PM
Matches what I know. My impression is that lots of parents have panicked about this, whereas not many kids have ever heard of it.
Even if that weren't the case, as a parent it's stupid to panic over this. Momo could only ever be a problem for young kids. If a parent of young kids isn't supervising them on the Internet, well...Momo would be the least of their worries.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.