A television station in Taiwan, Chinese Television System (CTS) ran a series of false alerts broadcasting that China had launched attacks on them.
They issued an apology on 20 April for causing public panic with their erroneous news.
CTS ran several alerts on their channels, saying that New Taipei City had been hit by the Communist army’s missiles; and that vessels, ships and facilities were damaged in the port of Taipei.
They also issued other erroneous alerts such as their president issuing an emergency order, and that war could break out.
CTS said in a statement, addressing the blunder:
“CTS offers its sincere apology that this serious flaw has caused panic among the public and trouble to relevant units.”
They blamed the blunder on a staff member who put out content from disaster prevention drills that they (CTS) were supposed to produce for the city’s fire department.
CTS also added that corrections have been run and that they will severely punish those responsible for the mistake, following a probe into the issue internally.
They also posted a message on their Facebook page, saying they mistakenly ran a war and disaster prevention message, and that there was no need to panic.