Type three digit number with “new cases” is proof of COVID-19 conspiracy? Fact Check

An online conspiracy claims to demonstrate that the COVID-19 pandemic has somehow been manufactured by the mainstream media, because you can type in any three digit number into Google followed by the term “new cases” and dig up a news report with that exact number.

FALSE

While the phenomenon of typing any three digit number into Google followed by “new cases” does indeed almost certainly result in a corresponding media reports with that exact number being served up (we tested it ourselves) this is demonstrably not proof of any type of conspiracy. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. This is actually a demonstration of a near mathematical inevitability.

That is to say, given the [justified] popularity of coronavirus stories in the media, and the length of time the coronavirus has been spreading across the world, it would be perfectly reasonable to expect any three digit number to appear in the context of new cases, at some locale in the world, at some point in 2020.

It’s an exercise of simple mathematics. Let’s take just the United States, for example, and its 50 states. At the time of writing, the coronavirus has been spreading significantly for around four months. That’s about 120 days.

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For the United States as a whole, that is 120 “new cases” numbers being reported by news outlets.

It would be a reasonable assumption to say that statewide media would naturally report on the number of new coronavirus cases in their respective states each day over the last four months. So over the course of 120 days, and 50 states, there would be 6000 news reports. 6000 news reports, each reporting on a new number of new cases reported in their respective state on a given day, and now it is clear to see that that is likely to take a significant chunk off the 900 three digit numbers available for someone to type into Google.

Of course, media reports are not limited to reporting on statewide “new cases”. City-wide and town-wide media outlets will also report on the number of new cases reported in their respective locales each day (or most days) as well. There are over 19,000 such locales across the United States. For the 120 days, that’s over two million “new cases” numbers to be reported on across the various locales within the United States over the last 4 months, in addition to the 6000 statewide “new cases” numbers and, of course, the 120 “new cases” numbers for the US as a whole.

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That will, at an almost certainty – take up all of the numbers between 100 and 999, probably multiple times.

And that exercise is just within the United States. Google pulls up results from around the world, and from news outlets in every country in the world, as well as every city, town, village, parish or any other label or description given to a significantly sized community capable of determining how many new cases their respective locale has seen on any given day over the last four months.

All of this leads to one simple conclusion. The number of new cases of coronavirus within a particular locale somewhere in the world, at some point in 2020, that will inevitably be reported on by some media outlet, is exceptionally large. It is a near-certainty that every three digit number will match some media report out there in the expansive digital landscape that Google encompasses.

We rank the claim this “type in three digits followed by new cases into Google to prove a conspiracy” claim as false.