Twitter account fools news outlets into reporting Woolworths return to the UK

A fake Twitter account has managed to trick a number of British online news outlets into erroneously reporting that the Woolworths chain of stores are reopening on UK high streets.

This, despite the fake Twitter account spelling the name of the store incorrectly twice in their “announcement” tweet.

The ruse began when the fake Twitter account, using the handle @UKWoolworths and sporting the Woolworths logo, posted the below message announcing that some trial stores in the UK would be opening in 2021.

Here to save 2020.
Woolworths is coming back to your High Street, as a physical store.
A couple of legal things to get sorted but we’re full steam ahead at Woolworths HQ.
We want to get this right, so we need your help.
What do you want at your UK #YourWoolworths?”

That was soon followed by another tweet that misspelt the name of the store twice.

So we’re popular (that’s for sure!)
Our trial stores will be open in 2021. Very own the online Woolsworths, so we will be retail only. Before the launch we have a few legal contracts to sign, but we’re super excited!
This will be your Woolsworths

A website linked to in the Twitter biography of the fake account was only registered the same day.

The tweets were picked up by various media outlets, including The Metro and The Mirror, who appear to have published a story confirming the reopening based only on the merits of the unverified Tweets.

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However most media outlets have now corrected their stories after more eagle eyed readers noticed the discrepancies, including the misspellings. The Metro wrote –

Yes, even Metro.co.uk was fooled for a brief moment, but a faulty link to a website on the account’s bio raised doubts of the announcement’s legitimacy.

Very, the company that holds the trademark to Woolworths in the UK, dismissed the fake tweets –

The Twitter account UKWoolworths is not connected to the Very group.

Hopefully the UK news outlets that appear so have been so easily duped will perhaps be a little more sceptical of unverified, misspelled tweets next time around.