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UFO Attack On Turkey A Hoax: UFO Expert Says Purported Turkish Pics Are Old Photos From Elsewhere [Debunked]

By Lorenzo Tanos
Published on: 21:50 PST, Nov 30, 2016

Reports of a UFO attack on Turkey had exploded on Twitter on Sunday and Monday, with many Turkish residents purportedly seeing unidentified flying objects, and the UFOs apparently reappearing in other parts of the world. But new evidence suggests that the UFO sighting was a hoax all along and that the images didn’t actually come from Turkey.

Over the past few days, the hashtag “#ufoattackonturkey” had trended on Twitter, but as that was happening, UFO expert and UFOOfInterest.org admin Scott Brando had gone to work, checking to see if those sightings were legitimate, or another attempt to shock people with bizarre, yet ultimately fake news. Brando related his experience in a detailed report Wednesday from fact-checking blog Doubtful News.

“I noticed that the keywords ‘UFO turkey’ were very frequent in the results of my research. Reading several tweets about this alleged mass UFO sighting, people shared them with the hashtag #ufoattacktoturkey.”

As it turns out, the original “UFO attack on Turkey” story came from SecureTeam10, a UFO “hoax site” with its own YouTube channel. The video of the alleged UFO sighting has since garnered close to 500,000 views, with more than 7,000 users giving the clip a thumbs-up and another 500-plus users disliking it. A second video, promoting an “update” on the original report, has also gotten tons of attention from YouTube users; it is substantially longer at 11 minutes, and channel administrator Tyler Glockner tried to clarify his intentions in posting the first video, as well as the rise and fall of “#ufoattackonturkey” as a trending hashtag.

In the second video, Glockner also asserted that he “highly doubts” that the Turkish UFO sighting is a hoax, citing the volume of photos that had come in, alleging to show the lights over Turkey. He also insinuated that censorship is the reason why “#ufoattackonturkey” had lost its spot as the top trending topic on Twitter, even suggesting that it’s an example of how the media is controlled by the government, and that “they” may be hiding something people shouldn’t know about.

As Brando had discovered, it was all a ruse, one that was perpetrated by a Turkish Facebook group called “goygoyrail.” The group had posted a statement in Turkish on Monday, November 28, confessing that the UFO attack on Turkey was just a hoax, and something they had pulled off for “fun.” Doubtful News also noted that a good number of the Twitter accounts that helped the story trend on social media were new accounts, and that “pseudo-news” sites such as Headlines and Global News had supported Glockner’s claims of government cover-ups.

Cover-up or not, it does appear as if Twitter has removed all tweets pertaining to the now-debunked UFO attack on Turkey. Sensing the potential of fake news, it would appear as if the microblogging service acted quickly to nip things in the bud. Reddit also did its part to douse cold water on what turned out to be a hoax, closing a thread on the supposed UFO sighting.

Further, Brando told Doubtful News that he was able to reverse-engineer things to deduce that the photos of the bogus UFO attack came from old sources, and didn’t come from Turkey at all.

“I immediately remembered these old sightings. This is an old Italian case I know very well. It was a launch of a little hot air balloon to celebrate one of the patron saints. And this one was over Santiago in Chile: it’s the Chilean Air Force that usually performs several activities and ceremonies to celebrate anniversaries and new air school graduates.”

In conclusion, Brando believes SecureTeam10 is the “worst” among UFO hoaxers, not only because of how the claimed UFO attack on Turkey went viral, but also because of the YouTube channel’s massive popularity – currently, the account has 639,293 subscribers.

“Everything goes viral, and (SecureTeam10‘s Tyler Glockner) has become a source for many English tabloids which guarantee him many views,” Brando lamented.

[Featured Image by Ursatii/Shutterstock]

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