Marketing Agency Targeted Influencers To Spread Anti-Vaccine Information

As social media platforms began cracking down on misinformation, a shady marketing agency began targeting influencers to help spread anti-vaccine propaganda. Two YouTubers worked to expose the entire campaign.

German YouTuber and journalist Mirko Drotschmann said a marketing agency named Fazze offered to pay him to post videos that suggest the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine was three times more likely to cause death than the AstraZeneca vaccine. 

“I was shocked,” Drotschmann told BBC News “then I was curious, what’s behind all that?” 

The agency used information taken from multiple stories and pieced them together. At the heart of it was an article from a French outlet named Le Monde about a data leak from the European Medicines Agency. The information was put together out of context, creating a false narrative that the death rate statistics came from the leak. But the numbers were skewed.

French YouTuber Léo Grasset received a similar offer from the same company. A major red flag to Grasset was that the agency told him it was acting on behalf of an anonymous client.

Both influencers quickly realized they were being asked to spread incorrect information about vaccines amid the coronavirus pandemic. The goal? Create doubt about getting the shot.

The YouTubers pretended to be interested in finding out more. They were provided what they should say in their videos and asked not to mention that the video had a paid sponsor. Fail to disclose sponsored content goes against social media guidelines. In France and Germany, posting such content is illegal.

But instead of posting the content, Drotschmann and Grasset both exposed Fazze on Twitter. After the information became public, all of the articles Fazze had referenced disappeared, except the original Le Monde article. Other influencers came forward to say they were also approached but declined. But, at least two influencers appear to have followed through.

C'est étrange.
J'ai reçu une proposition de partenariat qui consiste à déglinguer le vaccin Pfizer en vidéo. Budget colossal, client qui veut rester incognito et il faut cacher la sponso.
Éthique/20. Si vous voyez des vidéos là dessus vous saurez que c'est une opé, du coup. pic.twitter.com/sl3ur9QuSu

— Léo Grasset (@dirtybiology) May 24, 2021

BBC News reached out to the email provided to Drotschmann and Grasset, but it bounced back from the agency AdNow. Fazze is a subsidiary of AdNow. The outlet managed to contact Ewan Tolladay, one of the two British directors for the company. 

He denied being part of the campaign to spread misinformation and said Fazze was a joint venture between the other director and a Russian man named Stanislav Fesenko. He said a mystery third person was involved but was unable to identify the unnamed partner. 

Tolladay said in light of the scandal, Fazze will cease operations. He also said they “are doing the responsible thing and shutting down AdNow here in the UK.”