David Emery's Urban Legends Blog

And it's a hoax that keeps on giving. Spouting panic-inducing nonsense borrowed from other false virus alerts dating back eight years, the "Postcard" warning has been in circulation since February, bolstered by the erroneous claim that Snopes.com has verified it as true.

A word to the wise: keep your antivirus software up to date and don't click on attachments or links in messages from unfamiliar or otherwise suspicious sources.

But don't believe everything you read in forwarded emails.

Find out more...

Email tells the story of a vehicle owner in Cartersville, Georgia who says he was cheated by a service station whose gas pumps were rigged to deliver less fuel than what was shown on the display. According to the anonymous message, one in four gas pumps are purposely miscalibrated this way. True or false?

Still circulating via email, a pair of photos taken in December 2007 showing an unusually large mountain lion allegedly hit by a vehicle on the back roads of West Virginia. The pictures are authentic, but the truth is that this cougar was nowhere near West Virginia when it met its unfortunate end. Read more...

A gallery of odd and arresting viral images -- some real, some fake, some persistently enigmatic -- as circulated on the Internets. Start here...

Listerine Antiseptic mouthwash -- it not only freshens your breath, it gets rid of pesky, biting insects too! At least that's what's claimed in this widely circulated email, with nary a scientific fact to back it up. Read more...

With major companies filing bankruptcy left and right, some folks are concerned that their gift cards may be rendered useless. And they're right -- at least in a few notable cases. Here's a forwarded email that lists six or seven recent bankruptcies (though not entirely accurately) and recommends fishing those cards out of the drawer and spending them right now. Read more...

Laurie Boeder reports that the FBI has effectively debunked a New York memorabilia dealer's claim that a videotape he allegedly sold for $1.5 million showing Marilyn Monroe engaging in sex acts had been carefully analyzed and vetted by the agency in the early '60s and indeed came from its own files. The existence of such a film has long been rumored but never confirmed. That remains the case today. Read more...

Image #1: This picture was taken near the South African coast during a military exercise by the British Navy.

Choose one: Real or Fake?

The Chicago Tribune reports that the cougar killed last month on the streets of Chicago was the same one sighted last January in Rock County, Wisconsin. Moreover, the DNA also matches that of specimens collected from mountain lions in the Black Hills of South Dakota, indicating that the animal must have migrated some 1,000 miles to meet its demise. Wildlife experts say this could mark a trend and that more midwestern sightings are likely.

As if on cue, a Chicago resident reported seeing a cougar just a few nights ago at the intersection of California and Lawrence avenues, a couple of miles from where the April 15 shooting took place. Read more...

My colleague Franny Syufy recently blogged about an Italian housecat who weighs an astonishing 35 pounds (that's "morbidly obese" to you and me) and has gotten a lot of press coverage because of his facial resemblance in some photos to the cartoon cat Garfield.

Now, I do not doubt that Orazio is real or that his diet consists largely of lasagna. What bugs me is that a few of the photos, especially this one on Ananova.com, have a slightly, um, Photoshopped look to them (the eyes and mouth in particular). Other photos, not so much.

Read more...