A vast web of vengeance: When online lies destroy lives
19 minutes to read
By: Kashmir Hill
Outrageous lies destroyed Guy Babcock s online reputation. When he went hunting for their source, what he discovered was worse than he could have imagined. Guy Babcock vividly remembers the chilly Saturday evening when he discovered the stain on his family. It was September 2018. He, his wife and their young son had just returned to their home in Beckley, an English village outside of Oxford. Babcock still had his coat on when he got a frantic call from his father. I don t want to upset you, but there is some bad stuff on the internet, Babcock recalled his father saying. Someone, somewhere, had written terrible things online about Guy Babcock and his brother, and members of their 86-year-old father s social club had alerted him.