Does video show lady working at ice cream stand foil kidnapping? Fact Check

ByCraig Haley

A video, allegedly a CCTV video, appears to show the moment a woman working at an ice cream stand foils an attempted kidnapping of a child.

FALSE

An example of the video as it appeared on Twitter is below.

This lady working the ice-cream stand is a real-life hero. Wait for it…

The video is almost certainly staged. This is demonstrated largely by the existence of a second video at the same location showing an almost identical “kidnapping attempt” that appears to be using the same people. That second video is below.

Additionally the alleged CCTV footage appears to “follow the action” in a way that a presumably unmonitored CCTV feed would not. What’s more likely here is that this is filmed on a smartphone being held by a third party.


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One could argue that the video was merely intended to highlight the very real dangers of kidnapping and child trafficking. However, given that there are no obvious disclaimers stating the video isn’t real, coupled with the fact that multiple videos exists at the same location with the same people performing a nearly identical stunt, a more pragmatic albeit cynical interpretation of this video is that it exists to boost the social media presence of those that posted the video as it accumulates shares and followers.

This is further highlighted by the fact that many instances of this video (and similar ones we found online) are often attached with captions imploring social media users to subscribe or follow various social media accounts.

Kidnapping and child trafficking are obviously legitimate concerns, but these videos seemingly exploit these concerns to boost social media presence. If you want to raise awareness to these serious issues there are a number of fantastic resources and even genuine footage of attempted kidnappings that you can share instead, without having to share content created by people that ostensibly want to exploit such content for trivial gain.