Turns out it was Police Scotland, the First Minister, and corporate media in the UK and elsewhere who were spreading false information.
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naddr1qv…gqlqA young Scottish girl who waved a knife and axe went viral on social media in August 2025. According to the accompanying narrative, she was trying to protect her sister from unwanted advances from a man. The police quickly arrested the twelve-year-old girl and stated that there was "no evidence" for the claims being spread, and cautioned the public against spreading false information. First Minister Swinney condemned "deliberate disinformation." The media described the man as a "family man." Newspapers reported on the danger of false narratives. The Bulgarian-born man was now convicted in June 2026 for assault and for threatening and abusive behavior. The man's sister pleaded guilty to assault.
The twelve-year-old's mother: "They told the truth and they were vilified. There were far too many lies at the beginning." And it wasn't the girls who lied. But no apologies are to be found.
This dynamic of silence is also visible at the heart of the EU. The Russian comedian duo Vovan and Lexus have for more than a decade engaged in tricking decision-makers - both Sweden's Minister for Foreign Affairs and Minister for Defence have been targeted. Their primary list of victims includes ECB President Christine Lagarde, who in a call with whom she believed was Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy disclosed non-public information about the launch of the digital euro. When the ECB was asked about what measures had been taken, they replied that "the ECB does not understand why any serious journalist would want to write about this."
A similar pattern repeats in Sweden. An investigative reporter managed to go undercover into Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson's innermost circle, with a made-up surname and a falsified portrait photo. The incident has been described as a "catastrophically poor security culture." An external expert saw that the photograph was AI-generated within minutes. The Security Service (Säpo) has chosen not to comment on the details of the incident or answer whether they failed in their protective duties.
Säpo pretends that the undercover operation was not a problem. The ECB pretends that the Lagarde call was not remarkable, despite the same seemingly simple methods continuing to bear fruit. And in Dundee, Police Scotland pretends that they never prosecuted a child for defending herself against a sexual predator—and never warned the public about "disinformation" when the truth was exactly as the girls said.
What unites these stories is the lack of learning. If an organization does not even acknowledge that an incident has occurred, there is no failure to evaluate. And if no failure is evaluated, there is nothing to learn from. The mistakes are doomed to be repeated, time and again.
Trust in the Scottish police fell during 2025 to its lowest level in over 40 years - a drop of eleven percentage points in a single year.
A bitter irony is exposed when the institutions that most loudly worry about disinformation on social media are simultaneously the ones spreading it. And when the institutions' betrayal affects innocent girls - and the apologies are absent - does the falling trust then not seem utterly natural?