Old baseless rumors about Clinton snuff film persist on social media

A video in a Sept. 11 Facebook post claims that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton "was again thrust into the spotlight as sensational claims about a supposed dark web video leak began to circulate." 

"Hillary Clinton is in a frenzy after a supposed secret video surfaced on the mysterious dark web," the video’s narrator says. 

The video’s misspelled caption: "Hillary Clinton in trouble as her d.a.rk w.eb video leakded."

This post was flagged as part of Meta’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram.)

Where is this "supposed" video? Well, the narrator in this Facebook video never says, despite baiting viewers with descriptions that it shows Clinton "in a shocking and sinister way" and touches on claims that Clinton was involved in the sexual assault and murder of a girl. 

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The "supposed" video is also described as a "sensational conspiracy theory," a "frazzledrip conspiracy theory" and an "unsettling and entirely baseless rumor."

Several minutes into the video, the narrator contradicts the Facebook post’s caption: "In the real world, there’s absolutely no evidence to show that such a video or these events ever really happened. … It’s pure fiction, a story cooked up from someone’s imagination. You won’t find it on the dark web or anywhere else because it doesn’t exist." 

Frazzledrip, according to the Anti-Defamation League, "is a rumored dark web snuff film" showing Clinton and her aide Huma Abedin "sexually assaulting and murdering a young girl, drinking her blood and taking turns wearing the skin from her face as a mask." 

But as the Anti-Defamation League and the Facebook video itself say: This video doesn’t exist, and the caption is False.