You would think a press release about a German Nazi war criminal named Johann Bach being caught in the jungles of Goa after trying to sell a stolen 18th-century piano would be worth double-checking.
Nonetheless, the press release has been regurgitated on the front pages of the Deccan Herald and the Indian Express and inside the Telegraph, citing Perus Narkp, “the intelligence wing of the Berlin-based German Chancellor’s Core (sic)”, as the source.
Perus Narkp, a not especially Germanic name, is an anagram of “Super Prank”.
The organisation’s motto, printed at the top of the press release, is “Eht rea enp cabk skripc” — clearly not the language of Goethe or Virgil, but another anagram: “The Pen Pricks are back”.
The Pen Pricks, who run a blog skewering the Goan press, promised readers on Sunday they were about to break a “big, Big, BIg, BIG” story. It looks like they succeeded. Still, it should not take pranksters to remind us that gullibility is a dangerous flaw in journalism.
