back in 2014, a website called the verge ran this story about the ebola crisis. this was at a time when the ebola crisis in africa and the international worries about the spread of ebola, some real panic about the ability of modern medicine to responsibly handle active cases of ebola, it was really at its height. what the verge reported on was a number of stories that were suddenly appearing on social media, mostly on facebook, that were stories about the ebola crisis, but they weren't real stories. here's how the verge put it back in 2014. quote, there's a scary story bouncing around facebook accruing hundreds of thousands of likes. the story says that the small town of purdon, texas, has been quarantined after a family of five there was diagnosed with ebola.