Rick Perry Oversees America's Nukes. He Just Fell For A Basic Instagram Hoax.
Energy Secretary Rick Perry, whose department oversees America’s arsenal of nuclear weapons, is among a number of high-profile public figures who fell victim to an online hoax this week.
A fake, badly worded legal notice shared to the Republican former Texas governor’s Instagram account on Tuesday warned that the Facebook-owned platform was changing its terms of service to make all messages and photos public.
“Feel free to repost!!” Perry wrote, with the hashtag #nothanksinstagram.
Actors Judd Apatow, Julia Roberts, Rob Lowe and Julianne Moore, and singer-songwriter Usher, also were reportedly fooled by the fake post.
The head of Instagram, Adam Mosseri, confirmed the meme was “not true” on Twitter:
If you’re seeing a meme claiming Instagram is changing its rules tomorrow, it’s not true - learn more here: https://t.co/Qy102zMQCm
— Adam Mosseri (@mosseri) August 21, 2019
People pointed out the phony nature of the notice to Perry, or whoever operates his Instagram account, and two puzzling responses were posted:
The post remained on Perry’s @governorperry account as of Wednesday morning.
In 2017, Perry was duped into talking with a Russian comedian who he thought was Ukraine’s prime minister.
Trevor Noah, the host of Comedy Central’s late-night “The Daily Show,” offered this amusing take on the scam:
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