Much of the content on the Chinese version of Wikipedia about medieval Russian history, may not be true, it has been revealed.
Posing as a scholar, a Chinese woman spent years conjuring up fictitious accounts of medieval Russian history, including aristocrats, battles and imaginary states.
The scam is one of the largest hoaxes on the open source platforms, that is used for free information by millions all over the world on a daily basis.
It was exposed last month by Chinese novelist Yifan, who was conducting research for a book when he came about an article about the Kashin silver mine.
The article, written by the user Zhemao had extensive sources, incredible details and even details about the refining process used in the 1300s.
Zhemao has also had 206 other articles to her credit since 2019.
Yifan was tipped off to the scam, after running the silver mine story by native Russian speaker and fact-checking the sources listed on the Wikipedia article. He eventually found that the entire article was falsified.
The scale of the scam however was only brought to light after a team of volunteer editors and other Wikipedians went through all the articles Zhemao had edited or written.
“The content she wrote is of high-quality and the entries were interconnected, creating a system that can exist on its own,” said veteran Chinese Wikipedian John Yip, who was part of the team that exposed the scam.
“Zhemao single-handedly invented a new way to undermine Wikipedia.”
One of Zhemao's articles was even put as a featured article by Wikipedia, and was translated into English, Russian and Arabic.
After the investigation exposed the scam, Zhemao was permanently banned from Wikipedia, and most of her articles were deleted based on community consensus.
Zhemao came clean about her lies, in a letter published to her Wikipedia account. In it, she explains that she neither speaks Russian or English, and that she was a housewife with a high school education.
She apologised in the letter, stating that she started the hoax because her husband was away for quite a long time on business and that she was bored.
“The knowledge I have right now is not enough to make a living. In the future I will learn a craft, work conscientiously, and not do pointless things like this any more,” she added.
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