Vaibhav Suryavanshi, a 14-year-old left-hander, scripts history by becoming the youngest and fastest Indian player to score an IPL century. As he sets the bar high for all, fame, recognition, accolades and appreciation come along the way.
While most of it was genuine, like his captivating smile, some aspects were fabricated. As Vaibhav stunned everyone with his unprecedented onslaught against the Gujarat Titans, dominating the men of the team, a fake X (formerly called Twitter) profile of the Rajasthan Royal player caused chaos on social media.
Using Suryavanshi's exhilarating show on Monday as a tool, an X account named Vaibhav Sooryavanshi, under the handle name @VaibhavOfficia, garnered the massive attention of netizens. The account quickly gathered followers and rapid engagement.
The fake profile used Vaibhav's photograph in the RR jersey in the display image, and its account reposted multiple tweets from the official X handle of RR before gaining massive engagement.
It did not stop there; the account also replied to Sachin Tendulkar's message for the player, where the cricket legend quoted Vaibhav's 101 off 38 balls. Tendulkar's post read, "Vaibhav¡¯s fearless approach, bat speed, picking the length early, and transferring the energy behind the ball was the recipe behind a fabulous innings. End result: 101 runs off 38 balls. Well played!!"
Noticing the tweet, Vaibhav's fake profile quickly replied to the tweet by saying,"Thank you so much Sir. It¡¯s been a dream to earn a compliment from someone I¡¯ve admired. Grateful beyond words."
As soon as the post surfaced on social media, it quickly garnered a lot of attention, as most of the X users believed that it was a genuine account.
The thanks post by the fake account received about 55,000 likes and over 4,000 reposts on the same, but X took immediate action to stop the spread of misinformation. Moreover, X provided three major reasons for the account being fake:
1. The fake account was not followed by the Rajasthan Royals (RR), as they follow all their players.
2. The account handle uses 'Officia; professional accounts tend to avoid such names.
3. All the tweets and replies originated on 28th April, which is likely to garner engagement.
Hours later, the account was suspended, but the user used the same credentials to form a new profile with the ID @Vaibhavsooryava. The reply to Tendulkar's tweet was missing, but the other posts are still visible.
However, it is likely only a matter of time before X takes down the fake profile as well.?
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