Following the assassination of former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, a Greek news outlet and a French politician misidentified Metal Gear creator Hideo Kojima as the suspected assassin. A day after misinformation spread online, Kojima Productions acknowledged it’s considering legal action in “some cases” of “fake news and rumors.”

On July 8, Abe was shot during a campaign event in Japan and later died from his injuries. According to police, the suspect is 41-year-old Tetsuya Yamagami, who they also say confessed and used a homemade gun. That same day, Kotaku reported on a series of racist jokes taken seriously by a far-right French politician and a media outlet. In both instances, Kojima was misidentified as the gunman using a photo of him next to a famous image of Cuban revolutionary Che Guevara.

Metal Gear creator Hideo Kojima was misidentified as Shinzo Abe's assassin after a 4chan rumor was spread on Twitter. — Screenshots of Damien Rieu’s tweets from French politician and journalist Clémentine Autain.

The image wound up in viral Twitter threads as evidence of left-wing extremism. Far-right French politician Damien Rieu, who tweeted photos of Kojima, also mentioned this as a link to left-wing extremism. Rieu later apologized for spreading the rumor and deleted his original tweet. In response to the Kojima Productions post, some users shared screenshots of 4chan threads starting the rumors with racist jokes about the developer.

The 4chan “joke” also made its way to a Greek broadcast report from Antenna (ANT1). The outlet has since removed its footage from YouTube, but archived video uploads are still on Twitter. During the broadcast, ANT1 recounts Abe’s assassination and shares several images of Kojima — including the Che photo used as bait for the left-wing extremism panic. Kojima Productions does not mention a specific circumstance for today’s tweet, but it seems to be regarding ANT1’s broadcast and Rieu, or possibly both.

“#KojimaProductions strongly condemns the spread of fake news and rumors that convey false information,” a Kojima Productions representative wrote. “We do not tolerate such libel and will consider taking legal action in some cases.”

#KojimaProductions strongly condemns the spread of fake news and rumors that convey false information. We do not tolerate such libel and will consider taking legal action in some cases. pic.twitter.com/fDi0FR9kB0

— KOJIMA PRODUCTIONS (Eng) (@KojiPro2015_EN) July 9, 2022

In an era of online misinformation, false accusations run rampant. Social media arms trolls with easy access to populations eager to back-up bigotry and bias, and these companies have been slow in the response. Just this year, Twitter finally introduced its “crisis misinformation policy.” However, a quick search on the platform still yields results from right-wing accounts spreading a “joke” about a Japanese developer with no filter. Twitter’s policy takes aim at “the most severe harm” by adding a warning before viewing the tweet.

Abe’s assassination also spawned other right-wing misinformation claims. In a fact-checking report from the AP, the news agency found a screenshot of Abe’s Twitter account circulating misinformation to be fabricated. In the image, the fake Abe account uses the internet meme “I have information that will lead to the arrest of Hillary Clinton.” No matter how the extremely-online types think they’re foolproof, this stuff has real-world consequences.

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