2 students charged after another bomb threat at Carolina Forest High School
CAROLINA FOREST, S.C. (WBTW) — Two students have been charged after a bomb threat at Carolina Forest High School late Thursday evening, Horry County police said Friday.
The students were charged with communicating a school threat. They were issued a juvenile summons and taken to the Department of Juvenile Justice in Columbia.
“Their actions created further worry, unrest and misinformation in our community,” Horry County police spokesperson Mikayla Moskov said. “We will hold individuals accountable for their illegal activities.”
Moskov said another threat was received on Friday, bringing the total to five. Authorities conducted a search with “swiftness and efficiency” and the threat was found to be another hoax. Multiple officers will remain at the school throughout the day on Friday.
“HCPD takes the safety and security of our local students, faculty and school campuses seriously. Any and all threats will continue to be investigated and those responsible held accountable for their actions,” Moskov said. “That said, significant resources have been expended this week for threats that ultimately proved to be fake, some created by local individuals and some by foreign parties.”
The threat called into Horry County authorities Thursday night was the third one directed toward the school since a “threatening phone call” on Wednesday that led to students being evacuated. All of the threats have been hoaxes, authorities said.
The threat received Thursday night by Horry County police came on the heels of one earlier in the day that authorities said was traced to an internet server in India. That incident began with a bomb threat at the school and was followed by nearly simultaneous calls to Myrtle Beach and Horry County 911 dispatchers about an active shooter in the school.
The server identified in the threat was also linked to another threat on Thursday in the Midwest, Moskov said.
“One of the things that I think all Americans agree on is that there are way too many spam phone calls,” said Robby Hill, the CEO of Hillsouth IT. “I would kind of put these fraudulent bomb threat calls into that category of spam calls.”
Authorities also said Thursday that they were aware of “additional misinformation in the community surrounding the incident.” Some of that information claimed that there was a real threat to safety, police said. However, it appears to have been generated by Artificial Intelligence programs and shared via social media.
“I think A.I. is still evolving and it’s becoming more realistic every day,” Hill said. “I just don’t think the tools are there yet for public or even government yet.”
“I would say what’s happening in this situation is a form of cyberterrorism,” Hill continued. “Because it’s internet-based, it’s very difficult, if not impossible, to trace the actual source of this threat. And yet, it creates fear in our community, which is what the terrorists want.”
Hill talked about the accessibility of A.I.
“Now, good guys and bad guys, both have access to a lot of more artificial intelligence,” he said. “So, for example, there are free tools that a bad guy can use. In this A.I. boom rush, that gold rush that we’re in right now, to generate pictures that look very realistic, you can upload a photo of a school, you can ask A.I. to modify it, and you have this done in seconds. And you can share it along with your fake phone calls, with bomb threats. And it can just be very difficult to ferret this out.”
About 3,000 students attend the school as of the 2022-2023 school year, making it one of the largest public high schools in South Carolina.
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Caleb is a digital producer at News13. Caleb joined the team in January 2023 after graduating from Liberty University. He is from Northern Virginia. Follow Caleb on X, formerly Twitter, and read more of his work here.
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Savannah Denton joined News 13 in July 2023 as a reporter and producer. Savannah is from Atlanta, Georgia, and is a graduate of the University of Alabama. Follow Savannah on X, formerly Twitter, and read more of her work here.
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