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Users on social media are sharing a TikTok video showing people being implanted with a microchip, overlaid with text alleging that this will become part of all coronavirus vaccines. This claim is false as the footage has been taken out of context.
As of May 14, 2020 this video has been shared over 22,800 times on Facebook. Examples can be seen here , here , here and here
Most of the iterations of this claim feature a poor quality screengrab from a news broadcast with an overlaid text that reads “The R.F.I.D CHIP Coming in all corona vaccine shots In next 18 months (MARK OF THE BEAST).”
The original footage has been cropped and taken out of context. The video actually shows a 2017 report from NBC News’ Today show about a Wisconsin company which offered its employees the chance to have a microchip implant in their finger that they could use to buy snacks, log in to computers or activate the copy machine (here).
story was reported by several media outlets, including Reuters ( here ), the New York Times ( here ) and the BBC ( here ).
The devices by Three Square Market which are featured in the video are not GPS enabled, nor designed for tracking purposes ( 32chip.com/ ). “We’ve never been in this to advocate that all people get chipped. That’s not our agenda,” said Todd Westby, CEO of Three Square Market, in a press release visible here .
The TikTok clip, posted by user @globaltrending (now deleted), is actually filmed from a five minute YouTube conspiracy video titled “Coronavirus vaccine is the digital ID chip wow!” uploaded on April 12, 2020. The video falsely claims that “The digital ID chips is in the vaccine shot, that’s why they want everybody to take it”. It uses the clip from NBC’s Today report (taken out of context) as “proof” ( here ). There are several other claims within the video, which are out of scope of this Fact Check.
No vaccine has yet been approved for use against the coronavirus, which causes COVID-19, though more than 100 are in development and at least 10 have reached the clinical testing stage ( here ). There is no evidence suggesting these vaccines will have a Radio-Frequency-Identification (RFID) chip.
Reuters has previously debunked false claims on social media that U.S. philanthropist Bill Gates planned to use microchip implants to fight the coronavirus ( here ).
False. The video from a 2017 news report has been taken out of context. There is no COVID-19 vaccine available yet nor evidence that a potential vaccine will include a microchip.
This article was produced by the Reuters Fact Check team. Read more about our work to fact-check social media posts here .
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
All quotes delayed a minimum of 15 minutes. See here for a complete list of exchanges and delays.