This message claims that the Make-A-Wish Foundation will donate the sum of 7 cents to help pay a young cancer sufferer’s medical bills every time the email is forwarded. In this case, the supposed recipient of this charity is 21-year-old Bryan Warner. However, these claims are completely false and, like other variants, the message has been denounced as a hoax by the Make-A-Wish Foundation itself.
The message is simply a rehash of an earlier hoax that requested help for 7-year-old Amy Bruce. In fact, there have been a number of email forwards that use the same scenario, including versions involving children named Chad Briody and Kayla Wightman. From time to time, someone apparently reworks one of the older versions by substituting a new name and a different age for the supposed cancer victim. All versions of the message are equally false.
The Make-A-Wish Foundation does not participate in fund-raising campaigns based on how many times a particular message is re-posted. Nor would any other legitimate organization.
There is simply no reliable or ethical method of tracking an individual message that may be forwarded many thousands of times. Accurately tallying the amount of money to be donated would be virtually impossible. Moreover, considering how many times such a message may ultimately be re-posted (a figure quite possibly in the hundreds of thousands), the resulting financial obligation may well be enough to deplete the coffers of even the largest of charities.
It is simply absurd to suggest that any organization would lend itself to a completely random, unpredictable, and totally uncontrollable scheme based on the haphazard forwarding of an email. Any message that claims that donations are dependent on how many times the information is forwarded to others is almost certainly a hoax.
Please do not pass on messages that make such ridiculous claims. Such messages help no one and are intended only to fool gullible recipients into clicking the “Forward” button.
Example
Bryan Warner
[Phone Number Removed] Home
Please feel free to call me for anything.
*hey it wont cost you but 10 seconds of your time*
Importance Notice
After considerable thought and with an ache in my heart, I have decided that the time has come to close down the Hoax-Slayer website.These days, the site does not generate enough revenue to cover expenses, and I do not have the financial resources to sustain it going forward.
Moreover, I now work long hours in a full-time and physically taxing job, so maintaining and managing the website and publishing new material has become difficult for me.
And finally, after 18 years of writing about scams and hoaxes, I feel that it is time for me to take my fingers off the keyboard and focus on other projects and pastimes.
When I first started Hoax-Slayer, I never dreamed that I would still be working on the project all these years later or that it would become such an important part of my life. It's been a fantastic and engaging experience and one that I will always treasure.
I hope that my work over the years has helped to make the Internet a little safer and thwarted the activities of at least a few scammers and malicious pranksters.
A Big Thank You
I would also like to thank all of those wonderful people who have supported the project by sharing information from the site, contributing examples of scams and hoaxes, offering suggestions, donating funds, or helping behind the scenes.I would especially like to thank David White for his tireless contribution to the Hoax-Slayer Facebook Page over many years. David's support has been invaluable, and I can not thank him enough.
Closing Date
Hoax-Slayer will still be around for a few weeks while I wind things down. The site will go offline on May 31, 2021. While I will not be publishing any new posts, you can still access existing material on the site until the date of closure.Thank you, one and all!
Brett Christensen,
Hoax-Slayer
