• A tweet purportedly sent from an LG smart fridge went viral this week, seemingly the act of an Ariana Grande fan desperate to keep tweeting.
  • A series of posts by “Dorothy” appeared to show her tweeting from her iPhone, Nintendo Wii, and Nintendo DS as each was confiscated.
  • Then came a tweet with the source tag “LG Smart Refrigerator,” which went viral and prompted humorous responses from Twitter and LG.
  • However, reporting from BuzzFeed found that LG fridges do not have a Twitter app, suggesting that the “LG Smart Refrigerator” label was likely invented.
  • BuzzFeed demonstrated that it is possible to label a tweet’s “source” as more or less anything.
  • It is not impossible to tweet from a smart fridge, but seems unlikely. “Dorothy” did not answer BuzzFeed’s questions, which she were “rude.”
  • Editor’s note: This story was updated after questions were raised about whether the tweet was genuine.
  • Visit Business Insider’s homepage for more stories.

A tweet went viral this week for seemingly being sent from a teen girl’s smart fridge after her mom confiscated all her devices.

However, the narrative behind the tweet has prompted skepticism after BuzzFeed demonstrated that the tweet’s source label – “LG Smart Refrigerator” – can easily be faked.

The fridge tweet was the culmination of what seemed to be a battle of wills between a 15-year-old girl – Dorothy – and her mom.

Dorothy claimed her phone was confiscated, prompting her to send tweets labelled as coming from her Nintendo Wii U, her Nintendo 3DS, and, finally, the family fridge.

Dorothy's account, @thankunext327, mainly functions as an Ariana Grande fan page.

https://twitter.com/thankunext327/status/1159505376066383872?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

In messages to New York magazine, Dorothy's account said the confiscation came after she "was boiling rice and was too busy on phone and stove burst into flames."

lg smart fridge

Foto: The LG InstaView ThinQ smart fridge.sourceLG

Both Twitter and LG tweeted their support, jumping on the #FreeDorothy hashtag.

https://twitter.com/Twitter/status/1158796820627283973?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

Other news outlets conducted interviews with "Dorothy" via her Twitter account, and Business Insider initially reported Dorothy's narrative based on other outlets' reporting.

However, BuzzFeed's Stephanie McNeal demonstrated in an article that it is easy to falsify the apparent source of a tweet to say more or less anything.

She also found that LG fridges do not have their own Twitter app which could auto-generate a label like the one on Dorothy's tweet.

It is possible to tweet from an LG smart fridge, via its web browser. However, using that function would generate the source "Twitter Web Client."

Dorothy declined to answer McNeal's questions about her tweets, calling her skepticism "rude."