A recent craze in tech-enabled romance — as reported by several media outlets and acted out in a recent episode of CSI: Miami – is for people with Bluetooth-enabled phones to hook up for illicit, anonymous sexual encounters. It’s called "toothing" and oh my is it a sexy story. Reuters wrote about it, as did Wired News and the BBC, among others. Unfortunately, the story is too good to be true: the creators of "toothing" recently revealed it to be a hoax. We offer thanks to Jim Hanas who drew our attention to this story. His blog has some great info about the lack of "toothing" corrections here. Here’s how Reuters explained "toothing" to the world:
LONDON, England (Reuters) — British commuters take note — the
respectable person sitting next to you on the train fumbling with their
cell phone might be a "toother" looking for sex with a stranger."Toothing" is a new craze where strangers on trains, buses, in bars
and even supermarkets hook up for illicit meetings using messages sent
via the latest in phone technology."Toothing is a form of anonymous sex with strangers — usually on
some form of transport or enclosed area such as a conference or
training seminar," says the "Beginner’s Guide To Toothing" on a Web
site dedicated to the pursuit…
As of now, it appears that Wired News is the only outlet to have officially corrected the story (aside from many blogs). Here’s the note it attached to its "toothing" story:
This story is a hoax. Dozens of news organizations, including Wired
News, were duped by pranksters claiming to be practitioners of
"toothing," in which strangers in the U.K. were meeting up on commuter
trains for clandestine sexual encounters. The liaisons were supposedly
organized through messages broadcast via Bluetooth phones and
handhelds. However, one of those involved now says
the story was an elaborate hoax. After first creating an online forum,
the pranksters persuaded friends to fill the site with scores of
salacious, but fictitious, stories. It was from the contributors to
this forum that Wired News found and interviewed – by email – the
subjects of the story.
Hanas also points to a correction/story from UK tech site The Register. It’s time for the other outlets who ran "toothing" stories to step up and run a correction, or publish a story that admits they were fooled and describes how the hoax spread. Failing to do so deprives readers of necessary information and sends a strong message that the media lacks the resolve to correct its mistakes. It also emboldens would-be hoaxers who can cite the media’s refusal to eat humble pie as justification for their actions.
