These social media posts on free giveaways of damaged goods for commenting below them are fake - FACTLY
Sai Krishna Muthyanolla
March 14, 2023
Update (14 March 2023):
Sharing a picture of American television host Oprah Winfrey with her partner Stedman Graham, a post is being circulated on social media claiming that the couple is giving away 300 Honda civic cars that could not be sold because of minor scratches and damages. The post asks users to write “Done” in the comment section to grab Oprah’s free car giveaway. Let’s verify the claim made in the post.
Claim: Oprah Winfrey and her partner Stedman Graham announced that they are donating 300 Honda Civic cars.
Fact: Neither Oprah Winfrey nor her partner Stedman Graham made such an announcement of donating 300 Honda Civic cars to the people. In 2004, as part of the promotion of General Motors company’s Pontiac G6 car, Oprah Winfrey presented 276 brand new Pontiac G6 cars to the audience present in her show. Lately, Oprah Winfrey did not make any such announcement of a free-car giveaway. Hence, the claim made in the post is False.
When we searched to check whether Oprah Winfrey or Stedman Graham had made any such announcement on donating minorly damaged 300 Honda Civic cars, we could not find any such announcements on the official social media handles of Oprah Winfrey and Stedman Graham. In 2004, as part of the promotion of General Motors company’s Pontiac G6 car, Oprah Winfrey presented 276 brand new Pontiac G6 cars to the audience in her show. Several news websites published articles about Oprah’s free car giveaway in 2004. The cars Oprah Winfrey gifted to the audience in her show were General Motor company’s Pontiac G6 and lately, she did not make any announcement about donating 300 Honda Civic cars.
Published (14 September 2022):
A post is being widely shared on social media claiming that the Palam Metro Station in New Delhi is donating 670 refrigerators and stoves that could not be sold because of minor scratches and other damages. Sharing a collage of images, this purported Facebook post of Palam Metro Station states, “We are happy to announce that we will be donating 670 refrigerators And stoves that cannot be sold due to minor scratches and minor damage, all machines are working, so we will randomly send to someone who wrote, “Done”. before September 24th.!!” Let’s verify the claim made in the post.
Claim: A Facebook post of Palam Metro Station announcing the donation of 670 refrigerators and stoves that could not be sold due to minor damages.
Fact: Neither the Palam Metro Station nor any of the Metro stations under the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation announced such a donation of minorly damaged refrigerators and ovens. The same message was shared by many other parody Facebook pages while attributing to different companies like Target, Walmart, Haier, and others. All these posts are shared as part of a survey scam to obtain the personal and sensitive details of users. Hence, the claim made in the post is FALSE.
When we searched to check whether the Palam Metro Station had announced any such donation of minorly damaged refrigerators and ovens to people, we could not find any credible reports confirming such an announcement from the Palam or any other metro stations under the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation. The Delhi Metro Rail Corporation did not publish any such tweet announcing the donation of 670 refrigerators and ovens. The purported post was published from a parody Facebook account of Palam Metro Station.
On searching for further details using keywords, we found that several Facebook fan pages with the names of Target Fans, Walmart Fans, Haier Fans, and Elektra Fans have shared the same messages attributing them to the respective companies. But we could not find any such announcements on the official social media handles of Target, Walmart, and other companies. Apart from asking the users to reply ‘Done’ in the comment section, these Facebook posts shared a link asking users to register their names.
On clicking the link, it led to a dubious website asking the users to register their name, mobile number, and e-mail address. A fan page named ‘Walmart Fans’ published another similar fake message announcing the donation of bicycles.
‘Snopes’ published a fact-check article related to these fake donation announcements attributed to different companies. ‘Snopes’ in its article confirmed that all these messages offering free refrigerators and ovens are part of a survey scam. A few e-commerce websites like Amazon and Walmart do provide gift cards as prizes for customers who complete online surveys about their shopping experience. But these companies never ask participants to provide sensitive personal data.
To sum it up, the Palam Metro Station in New Delhi did not make any announcement about the donation of minorly damaged refrigerators and ovens.