Fact Check: Is the BBC news article on Tom Hanks getting arrested real or fake? Viral headline debunked

On November 27, 2022, an X (formerly Twitter) user with the handle @StarSeed_2020 posted an image of what appeared to be a BBC News story featuring the title “Tom Hanks arrested on 135 counts of child p*rn possession.”

The caption of the now-removed tweet read: “Remember this – Tom Hanks arrest was on the BBC website for a few moments.” The post garnered enough traction online and received over 35,000 views, with most people believing it was true.

Recently, it resurfaced on X, with netizens once again claiming that the A Man Called Otto star was recently taken into police custody on the same charges. However, several media sources, including Newsweek, debunked the tweet and confirmed that the BBC News Story photo doing the round on X was fabricated, and the media company never published any such article.

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Tom Hanks was not arrested recently on any charges

The image of a BBC News article about Tom Hanks’ arrest on 135 counts of child p*rnography possession that has been doing the rounds on X is false.

Reuters even confirmed that the photo had been digitally manipulated, and BBC News did not publish any such article. Besides, other photos showing Hanks wearing an ankle bracelet and talking to law enforcement personnel have also been fabricated.

Not only that, none of the other major media houses have published anything on Tom Hanks’ alleged arrest, making the piece of news false. In fact, Newsweek confirmed that the image used in the fake BBC News article was originally from June 2023, when the Forrest Gump actor touched down at New York City’s Ed Sullivan Theater to shoot for The Late Night Show with Stephen Colbert, accompanied by his wife Rita Wilson.

Snopes, on the other hand, reported that parts of the images and backgrounds shown in the deepfakes were taken from Hanks and Wilson’s visit to Australia in 2021 for the former’s film shoot. It also stated that a similar photo of the couple could be found in the BBC archive, used in a story related to the COVID-19 vaccination.

Moreover, there is no evidence that Tom Hanks is associated with child abuse, trafficking, or p*rnography. However, this is not the first time such claims have surfaced in his name.

Earlier, Hanks became the target of conspiracy in early 2021 when it was claimed that he had Greek citizenship because child abuse in Greece is “classified as a disability.” This claim came right after the Oscar winner received honorary Greek citizenship in late 2020.

It is also noteworthy that neither Tom Hanks is associated with pedophilia nor does Greece regard minor abuse as a disability. What’s even more interesting is that the X account (now suspended) from which the rumor emerged often deals with Qanon and COVID-19 vaccine-related conspiracy theories.

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Other celebrities who were targets of similar conspiracy theories in the past

In 2016, a conspiracy theory dubbed “Pizzagate” surfaced on social media platforms which claimed during the-then presidential cycle that the New York Police Department discovered a secret child abuse and trafficking ring linked to the members of the Democratic Party, allegedly revealed from the emails of former Democratic politican and convicted s*xual offender Anthony Weiner.

Then Presidential contender Hillary Clinton was at the center of the conspiracy theory, which was later debunked. Meanwhile, popular names such as Paul Walker, Anne Heche, and Anthony Bourdain were also falsely accused of being part of the pedophilia ring.