Misinformation Correspondent Angelika Etherington-Smith examines multiple instances of misinformation circulating in the wake of the tragic van collision, which claimed one life and sent two others to hospital.
At 11:40AM on Tuesday 18 March 2025, a woman was killed as three other pedestrians were injured as a van collided outside Bush House on King’s College London’s Strand campus.
While LBC and BBC were leading the coverage of the incident, hundreds of social media faux-news accounts started to put spin on the story, as distortions and misinformation spread rapidly.
One account shared the basics of the story alongside an image generated by Grok, the generative AI chatbot made by X.
While those local to the Strand campus can easily identify the image as fake, due to the inconsistent background, there was significant risk of the fake image being spread further.
More misinformation has, however, come from the public assumptions about the identity of the driver and the nature of the attack. Isabella Maria Deluca, a right-wing American activist who has been convicted and later pardoned for involvement in the January 6 Insurrection questioned, “Is it too early to assume the driver was a Muslim refugee?”
No identifiable information has been released regarding the identity of the driver. In a statement announcing the driver was in custody, the Met Police shared:
“The driver of the van, a 26-year-old man, was arrested at the scene on suspicion of causing death by careless driving and driving with a concentration of specified controlled drug above the specified limit.”
Another rumour was that this was a terrorist attack and that the campus at King’s College London has gone into lockdown. Several accounts shared the claim that ths incident was a form of terrorism. Others have claimed that this is a terrorist attack on the Muslim community due to the presumed religious affiliation of the student killed in the incident.
Neither claim was accurate with the Met Police sharing, “This collision is not being treated as terrorism-related.”
The security staff at the Strand campus limited the entrances and exits out of the King’s Building, Bush House South East and Bush House North East.
Students and staff were still able to enter and leave the campus through alternative entrances, and security supported and directed them to the closest points.
Right-wing media sources including Turning Point UK and Tommy Robinson posted about the situation, with some questioning the Met’s designation of the incident as “not terror related”.
Users in the comments of coverage by the Daily Express speculated that this incident was a consequence of “the Syria effect” or “a mental health issue”, with others mused that if the perpetrator had been white this detail would have been shared already.
The Met Police have yet to release any details identifying the driver or share an accurate official analysis of the incident.
Another piece of misinformation that was shared by the Daily Mail on Wednesday was the misspelling of the name of the person who died in the collision. Previously they have identified her as “Aliyah” and identified her as a “21-year old student”. This lack of clear identification and possible misidentification caused a lot of stress to the community still waiting to her from the university about the official development of events. Aalia Mahomed, the 20-year-old student was identified by her family in a Met Police Statement on March 20th.
Roar would like to echo the words of Detective Ch Supt Christina Jessah from the Met:
“We ask the public to refrain from this speculation to protect the integrity of the ongoing investigation and avoid causing further suffering to the family of the young woman.”
We encourage readers to take any unverified updates or speculations with scepticism and await official confirmation of sensitive details to prevent the spread of misinformation in this moment of tragedy.
Follow Roar’s coverage of the accident and all subsequent events here.
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