It was just a joke, but thousands of people didn’t think it was a laughing matter — and many were outraged.
They believed the City of Winnipeg was using facial recognition to track drivers for seatbelt and cellphone use based on a post from a satirical Facebook page called “The City of Winnipeg Complaints Department.”
On Thursday, it posted a picture of street cameras and said the city had launched a pilot project to combat distracted drivers, including a seatbelt and cellphone distraction camera equipped with AI facial recognition.
The post was shared more than 7,000 times and garnered 800 comments. The Facebook page has around 35,000 followers and includes the description, “We take your complaints seriously and resolve them in a comedic and satirical fashion.”
One Facebook user commented: “Well I would say stay away from that intersection.”
The page administrator, who wished to stay anonymous, said they came across a photo of an allegedly real city speed enforcement camera on Reddit.
“Once we saw the photo, our creative juices started flowing and we came up with the idea of facial recognition and AI detection,” said the admin, who uses the handle, Dr. Birt Binkus, manager of complaints.
The page admin said they didn’t expect the post to go viral but they’re glad it’s generating mixed reviews and opinions.
“Some people know it to be a joke, and others think that it’s real, and that definitely adds to the comedic factor. It also shows the truth about how easy it is to have ‘fake news’ spread so quickly,” the admin said.
Another account shared the post and said, “Who is excited for this s—t to be on every corner?”
The admin, who said the page was created in 2020 and is similar to satire Facebook pages for other cities, apologized to the people who believed the post was real.
“Sorry. Although our page does seem real, we mix in elements of satire to hopefully help those realize the truth. It’s online, so you have to take everything you see and read with a grain of salt,” said the admin.
Cecil Rosner, an adjunct professor at the University of Winnipeg and author of Manipulating the Message,
said people need to be more savvy about how they consume social media.
“In the world we’re in right now, where people are just flipping through their social media feeds on their phones rather rapidly, a lot of people will just quickly look at a headline, or an image, and then without bothering to even read the entire piece of content, share it with their friends and family,” said Rosner
He said if people aren’t careful or aware that something is satire, it can become problematic and erode people’s trust in institutions, such as municipal services, when people start mindlessly sharing information.
“You have to be skeptical of everything you see online these days,” Rosner said. “You have to demand what is the source of this information. Before you choose to believe something, whether it’s a news report, Facebook post, Twitter (X) post, or TikTok video, you have to think critically about it.”
This isn’t the first time one of the page’s posts has gone viral and duped users.
In 2021, the page made a satirical post asking people to “stop making sexually suggestive snow sculptures at city hall.” The post got widespread attention, even the New York Post wrote about it.
matthew.frank@freepress.mb.ca