The wackiness of QAanon and other conspiracy theorists is coming to a head over today's (or the 11th's) FEMA phone alert test.
Anti-Vaxxers Think an Emergency Phone Alert Will Cause a Zombie Apocalypse
The latest paranoia to grip online fringe communities is about FEMA supposedly sending harmful 5G signals to your phone
“IS THERE A Zombie Apocalypse activated by 5G towers on the way?!?!” wrote the QAnon influencer behind a Telegram channel called The Patriot Voice, which is followed by more than 50,000 people, in a post shared at the end of September. The message cites a supposed military expert’s claim that Covid-19 vaccines contain “sealed pathogens” including E. coli bacteria and the viruses Marburg and Ebola, all of which can be released by an “18 Gigahertz 5G frequency.”
“FEMA plans on doing a ‘test’ of the EBS on Oct 4 or 11 at 2:22PM. I would turn OFF ALL 5G devices,” the writer concluded. Similar claims about a test alert that will “activate” deadly diseases within vaccinated people — and warnings to turn off phones — have been viewed hundreds of thousands of times on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter.
Turn off your cell phones on October 4th. The EBS is going to "test" the system using 5G. This will activate the Marburg virus in people who have been vaccinated. And sadly turn some of them into zombies.
— gina shirah (@GinaShirah81815) October 1, 2023
Virtually nothing in these comments is accurate, save for the fact that the Federal Emergency Management Agency and Federal Communications Commission are conducting tests of the Emergency Alert System (EAS) and Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEA) on Oct. 4. (The Emergency Broadcast System, or EBS, was replaced by the EAS in 1997.) The wireless portion, to occur at approximately 2:20pm ET, “will be directed to all consumer cell phones,” and consist of a simple message: “THIS IS A TEST of the National Wireless Emergency Alert System. No action is needed.” At most, it will be a mild surprise or annoyance. And it certainly won’t turn you into a zombie (which the often fatal Marbug virus doesn’t do in any case).....
Anti-Vaxxers Think an Emergency Phone Alert Will Cause a Zombie Apocalypse
The latest paranoia to grip online fringe communities is about FEMA supposedly sending harmful 5G signals to your phone
“IS THERE A Zombie Apocalypse activated by 5G towers on the way?!?!” wrote the QAnon influencer behind a Telegram channel called The Patriot Voice, which is followed by more than 50,000 people, in a post shared at the end of September. The message cites a supposed military expert’s claim that Covid-19 vaccines contain “sealed pathogens” including E. coli bacteria and the viruses Marburg and Ebola, all of which can be released by an “18 Gigahertz 5G frequency.”
“FEMA plans on doing a ‘test’ of the EBS on Oct 4 or 11 at 2:22PM. I would turn OFF ALL 5G devices,” the writer concluded. Similar claims about a test alert that will “activate” deadly diseases within vaccinated people — and warnings to turn off phones — have been viewed hundreds of thousands of times on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter.
Turn off your cell phones on October 4th. The EBS is going to "test" the system using 5G. This will activate the Marburg virus in people who have been vaccinated. And sadly turn some of them into zombies.
— gina shirah (@GinaShirah81815) October 1, 2023
Virtually nothing in these comments is accurate, save for the fact that the Federal Emergency Management Agency and Federal Communications Commission are conducting tests of the Emergency Alert System (EAS) and Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEA) on Oct. 4. (The Emergency Broadcast System, or EBS, was replaced by the EAS in 1997.) The wireless portion, to occur at approximately 2:20pm ET, “will be directed to all consumer cell phones,” and consist of a simple message: “THIS IS A TEST of the National Wireless Emergency Alert System. No action is needed.” At most, it will be a mild surprise or annoyance. And it certainly won’t turn you into a zombie (which the often fatal Marbug virus doesn’t do in any case).....
