Monday, Feb. 7, 2022
Did Bill Gates say he had a company trying to create a coronavirus outbreak and that they were successful?
A video making the claim circulating on social media is an altered fabrication. While Gates did say each of the words and phrases separately in an interview, several short snippets were taken out of context and spliced together to produce a fake quote.
The original, full 12-minute interview from 2020 was altered by separating and joining several small segments to create the doctored 26-second clip.
The original interview, titled "Talking Tech and 2020 with Bill Gates!" was posted on the Marques Brownlee YouTube channel on Feb. 14, 2020. The interview covered several topics, but was mostly about electric cars. Near the end, Gates explains how important it is to him to answer his email in a timely manner. It is this segment of the original interview that captures Gates saying the words "coronavirus outbreak."
This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
Sources
- Marques Brownlee Talking Tech and 2020 with Bill Gates!
About fact briefs
Fact briefs are bite-sized, well-sourced explanations that offer clear "yes" or "no" answers to questions, confusions, and unsupported claims circulating online. They rely on publicly available data and documents, often from the original source. Fact briefs are written and published by Gigafact contributor publications.
See all fact briefs
Lead Stories is a fact checking and debunking website at the intersection of big data and journalism that launched in 2015. It scouts for trending stories, images, videos and posts that contain false information in order to fact check them as quickly as possible. It actively monitors the fake-news ecosystem and doesn’t wait for reader tips or reports before getting started on a story.
Learn MoreLatest Fact Briefs
Did California introduce a bill to allow mothers to kill their babies up to 7 days after birth?
Wednesday, Apr. 6, 2022
Did Biden suck dry the Strategic Petroleum Reserve?
Wednesday, Apr. 6, 2022