9 of the best technology conspiracy theories

From government surveillance programs to microchips in vaccines, technology-centric conspiracy theories have exploded in the digital age, adding to some of the best conspiracy theories already in existence.


1 The Large Hadron Collider is opening a portal to hell

Verdict: Not True


2 Tracking microchips in COVID-19 vaccines

Verdict: Not True


3 5G networks spread COVID-19

Verdict: Not True


4 The dead internet theory

Verdict: Partially True

Studies show bot traffic was responsible for 51% of all internet activity in 2024 — the first time bots surpassed humans. And since ChatGPT's launch, AI-generated content has exploded, with another study finding that 13.1% of websites now host such material.


5 Governments can control the weather

Verdict: Partially True

Basic forms of weather modification also exist today, in particular cloud seeding. This involves dispersing materials like silver iodide into clouds, which can marginally enhance rainfall. Countries like China and Saudi Arabia use the approach to assist in agriculture. China harnessed this technology to ensure clear skies for the 2008 Olympics.


6 Phones eavesdrop on you for ad targeting

Verdict: Partially True

For a start, constant audio recording would rapidly drain phone batteries and trigger visible indicators on phone displays. More importantly, unauthorized recording would create enormous legal liability for those who engaged in it.

But there is something potentially more unsettling behind the phenomenon. Online platforms, advertisers and data brokers are constantly collecting, curating and reselling every tiny piece of information they can glean from our online and offline behaviour. This allows them to develop incredibly accurate profiles of people to provide spookily appropriate, and timely, product suggestions.


7 Planned obsolescence

Verdict: Partially True

There is historical evidence that companies have pursued obsolescence as a strategy — in the 1920s, for instance, major light bulb manufacturers came together to form the "Phoebus cartel," which colluded to reduce bulb lifespans to just 1,000 hours. General Motors also pioneered annual model changes to entice customers to buy newer vehicles, creating a template that other industries copied. Technology vendors are particularly guilty — think smartphones with batteries that degrade in just a few years, or no longer support software updates.


8 Government-sponsored mind control programs

Verdict: True

In 1953, CIA director Allen Dulles launched a top secret program called MKUltra aimed at developing exactly those kinds of capabilities. The agency covertly contracted out 162 projects to various universities, research foundations and institutions to study how psychoactive drugs, hypnosis, electroshock therapy, sensory deprivation and various forms of torture could be used to manipulate people’s mental states.


9 Widespread digital surveillance

Verdict: True

In June 2013, former CIA contractor Edward Snowden leaked a treasure trove of classified documents to journalists that validated many of these fears.

The revelations uncovered a mass surveillance network operated by U.S. intelligence agencies and their foreign allies to collect phone records and monitor internet activity across the globe. Most prominently, it uncovered the PRISM program, operated by the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA), which used secret court orders to demand internet communication data from technology companies.

The U.K.'s Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) was also revealed to be tapping into 200 fiber-optic cables around the world, allowing it to monitor up to 600 million communications daily.

https://www.livescience.com/technology/t...y-theories

(June 18, 2026 at 12:53 am)Fake Messiah Wrote: Tearful Brazilian psychic predicts mass alien abduction during Scotland game

In an emotional video message, spiritualist Anatercia da Silva Gonçalves, known to her followers as Vo Bahiana, said scaly reptilian creatures will storm the turf and kidnap players during the final Group C showdown at the Hard Rock Stadium on June 24.

It’s bad news for Scotland fans as captain Andy Robertson, talisman Scott McTominay and fan favourite John McGinn are among the players who she predicts will be snatched.

So this game is going on right now and there are no aliens. Shit. Who could have known that she lied. But then again it's only been on for like 15 minutes so I guess there's still a chance that aliens will show up.

(June 24, 2026 at 6:16 pm)Fake Messiah Wrote:

(June 18, 2026 at 12:53 am)Fake Messiah Wrote: Tearful Brazilian psychic predicts mass alien abduction during Scotland game

In an emotional video message, spiritualist Anatercia da Silva Gonçalves, known to her followers as Vo Bahiana, said scaly reptilian creatures will storm the turf and kidnap players during the final Group C showdown at the Hard Rock Stadium on June 24.

It’s bad news for Scotland fans as captain Andy Robertson, talisman Scott McTominay and fan favourite John McGinn are among the players who she predicts will be snatched.

So this game is going on right now and there are no aliens. Shit. Who could have known that she lied. But then again it's only been on for like 15 minutes so I guess there's still a chance that aliens will show up.

A smart marketing firm would have rented a blimp shaped like a flying saucer and landed it on the field mid-game.

(June 24, 2026 at 8:10 pm)Paleophyte Wrote:

(June 24, 2026 at 6:16 pm)Fake Messiah Wrote: So this game is going on right now and there are no aliens. Shit. Who could have known that she lied. But then again it's only been on for like 15 minutes so I guess there's still a chance that aliens will show up.

A smart marketing firm would have rented a blimp shaped like a flying saucer and landed it on the field mid-game.

And the aliens would disembark wearing Pepsi jerseys.

Boru

Or they should have pulled K-PAX. You know, in that movie Kevin Spacey's character claims that he is an alien and that he will leave the Earth at the specific time, but when that specific time comes and goes, and he doesn't leave, his inmates claim that he left anyway, like spiritually.

So maybe the players were abducted spiritually.

It was a big day for UFOs yesterday and you haven't even noticed it. Adult people, some even with jobs, but most not, sat in Washington DC and talked about aliens as if they were real. There were even awards handed out. You really do live in a bubble, don't you?

Quote:UFO transparency at the heart of Disclosure Forum

Lawmakers and whistleblowers continued a push for transparency on UFOs at Thursday’s Disclosure Forum, exploring the ways it could change the country and people’s lives.

The forum featured panel discussions on issues around UAPs, including the congressional push for transparency, national security implications and the economic and religious impact of sightings.

Sen. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., announced that he and Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., are once again cosponsoring an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act that would increase executive branch disclosure on the subject of UAPs.

Rounds decried silos in government, including between congressional committees, that have complicated efforts.

Speculation has swirled around possible connections between a number of missing and dead scientists, some of whom are said to have connections to UAP research.

Pippa Malgren noted that it seems unlikely that so many people would disappear under normal circumstances and that this could hinder disclosure and create uncertainty for financial markets.

Jennice Vilhauer noted that stigma about the subject of UFOs can limit people from coming forward with information, thus limiting investigation into UAPs.

It can also impact the responses and care people receive who have had UAP encounters, including medical care.

Regarding monotheistic religion, Carlos Eire examined the existence of extraterrestrial life and how it might intersect with religion.

Harvard University astrophysicist Avi Loeb said evidence that could be used to prove whether UAPs are extraterrestrial in origin could include detailed satellite imagery and material that can be tested to determine whether it is of Earth origin.

Retired Rear Admiral Tim Gallaudet said scientific inquiry is the best way to sort legitimate experiences from false or easily explained ones. He emphasized the need for academic institutions to get involved.

Panelists said whistleblower protections are inadequate and the stigma around the topic can harm those who speak out.

Those who disclose may risk their reputations, damage their future career options and their ability to support themselves.

McConnell suggested it’s unclear, comparing it to indigenous people who came into contact with colonizers and who came out on the worse end of the deal.

He also noted that there have been cases where people have united against a common enemy, while also noting that it assumes aliens would be aggressive.

There are suggestions that other countries have recovered UAP technology.

“I don’t think we’re magically going to sing kumbaya once Trump or Xi or Putin announce the existence of nonhuman intelligence,” said former analyst Marik von Rennenkampff.

Retired Rear Admiral Tim Gallaudet stated that while America often feels secure because it is surrounded by oceans, there are frequent ocean sightings that indicate a national security threat from UAPs isn’t mitigated by ocean waters.

Former Pentagon insider and whistleblower Luis Elizondo was awarded the Disclosure Award for his work.

https://www.newsnationnow.com/space/ufo/...forum/amp/

Spooky discovery on mysterious Mount Shasta after horseback riders follow ‘apocalyptic’ sounds: ‘Summoning something’

Karrie Ann Snure and her daughter Jordan had been horseback riding in the area when they heard a creepy screeching noise blaring throughout the trees.

Curious, the pair investigated and went off the path and into some nearby brush, whereupon they found a patch of solar-powered Bluetooth speakers jutting up from the dirt.

“This is straight apocalyptic,” Snure declared. “Someone is summoning something here.”

After venturing up the mountain, the duo found veritable fields of these sinister-looking sound emitters arrayed about the trees.

The majority of the speakers — which Snure deduced were solar-powered — were blasting “white noise” although several played a recording of a sermon that mentioned “salvation,” she said.

“I think it sounds like white noise because they’re all playing the same thing, but when combined together and not properly synced it just sounds like static,” the content creator theorized in a follow-up clip. “The ones that were placed by themselves, you could make out a human voice coming out of them, repeating a mantra.”

All told, there were between 100 and 200 of the high-altitude loudspeakers, although their purpose remains unclear.

“There wasn’t any houses anywhere close by within miles, and nothing to want to ward off anything from so I guess this was definitely a summoning of some kind,” said Snure while discussing the “strange experience.”

She theorized that it could be a “Lemurian beacon system,” referring to a new age legend that claims that Mount Shasta houses a subterranean city inhabited by the descendants of a lost continent known as Lemuria.

According to the lore, a network of tunnels beneath the Golden State’s fifth-largest peak reportedly leads to their citadel, known as Telos.

Legend has it that the Lemurians are technologically superior, capable of interdimensional travel, and can even contact extraterrestrials.

Coincidentally, the volcano has been associated with supernatural phenomena, in addition to the Lumerians, entail everything from Native American deities to Sasquatch and even UFOs, according to Atlas Obscura.

https://nypost.com/2026/06/26/lifestyle/...oundtrack/

Heatwave ignites ‘weather control’ conspiracy theories in Poland

An extreme heatwave sweeping across Poland has triggered a wave of misinformation peddled by climate change deniers, including claims that shadowy global elites are controlling the weather, according to an Adam Maternik, an expert at NASK, a Polish state-run cybersecurity and internet research body.

Among the conspiracy theories circulating online are claims that a “global government” or undefined global elites are controlling the weather, Maternik told Polish state news agency PAP.


Another recurring narrative involves so-called “chemtrails,” referring to a claim—unsupported by scientific evidence—that condensation trails left by aircraft contain toxic chemicals deliberately released to control the weather and harm human health. Maternik said mentions of this theory have recently increased on TikTok.

Maternik said that another strategy used by climate change deniers is to downplay the severity of the current heatwaves.


This includes posts suggesting that similar periods of extreme heat were recorded in the 20th century, and thus the phenomenon is normal.


Some social media users cite Poland’s temperature record of 40.2°C, set in 1921 in Prószków, near the southern city of Opole. They suggest that current heat levels are part of normal fluctuations that are known from history.


However, Maternik told PAP that while such historical records did occur, they were typically isolated events that did not last long and did not affect large areas, unlike the current heat spell.


“These past situations are used to downplay the scale of the approaching heatwave,” he added.

https://tvpworld.com/94046120/misinforma...ask-expert

‘Invasion of Washington’ UFO tape may surface as lawmakers push release

On Thursday, Rep. Eric Burlison, R-Mo., announced at a forum on UAP transparency that a tape exists of a UFO briefing between Air Force officials and scientists in 1952. He said MIT’s Lincoln Laboratory, a federally funded research and development center, has agreed to make the material available.

Disclosure Foundation Executive Director Jordan Flowers told NewsNation the document is believed to be a reel-to-reel audio tape recording about the Washington, D.C., incidents. He credits Burlison, a member of the so-called UAP Caucus in Congress, with shaking the artifact loose.

The July 1952 UFO sightings over the U.S. capital were observed on radar as well as by eyewitnesses, including airline pilots who reported unusual lights in the sky. Military jets were scrambled in response — to no avail.

The story became sensationalized as news accounts described the mysterious objects as flying saucers. Cold War paranoia sparked theories that the Soviets were somehow behind the unexplained incursions into U.S. airspace.

The Air Force famously held a news conference at month’s end to tamp down all of the speculation, with authorities attributing the UFOs to the weather.

News that there is a tape recording about the Washington sightings is important, Flowers said, because it “proves that there’s significant material that have not been disclosed to the public about our government taking these things seriously for at least 70, if not 80 years.”

https://thehill.com/homenews/5944717-ufo...-evidence/

Conspiracy Theorists Are Losing Their Minds About CERN’s Big Shut Down

CERN is today being switched off for its third long shutdown, a process that will take four years. Predictably, many people are seriously freaked out about it.

The thousands of scientists who work there claim this vital maintenance will allow them to unlock more of the universe’s secrets and in doing so answer some of the biggest questions we have about matter, energy, and existence. However, if certain pockets of the internet are to be believed, it will also allow them to pry open portals to other dimensions, merge our timeline with parallel universes, summon demonic entities, and generally cause limitless chaos.

VICE put some of these concerns to Steven Goldfarb, an experimental particle physicist working for the University of Melbourne on the ATLAS Experiment at CERN. He told us that, theoretically, it would be possible to create a black hole—but it would only last 0.000000000000000000000000001 of a second. Furthermore, rather than being used as a doorway to let in aliens, werewolves, or doppelgangers (any of whom would need to be quick), any man-made black hole would be aiming to get to the bottom of the gravity conundrum that has plagued scientists for centuries.

For some religious critics and online doom-mongers, the language around CERN has always sounded dangerously close to humans trying to trespass on divine territory. The LHC has been compared to a modern Tower of Babel: a vast, technically brilliant monument built in pursuit of answers that humanity was never meant to have.

Many of the fears surrounding CERN come from interviews given by Dr. Astrid Stuckelberger, a Swiss researcher whose claims have become popular in CERN conspiracy circles and within the UFO “truther” community. Across several interviews, she has claimed that physicists told her there are 17 or more dimensions and that beneath the facility is a portal through which “beings” can come and go. One of her most viral claims is that a non-human entity appeared during one CERN experiment and stole a scarf. Perhaps aliens like holiday souvenirs, too?None of her claims have ever been verified, and the CERN staffers we spoke to for this feature denied that she’d ever had any connection with the facility in a professional sense.

Most of the CERN conspiracies, however, relate to what happens when the machine is restarted after an “off” period. The first scheduled maintenance—known as LS1, or Long Shutdown 1—lasted from 2013 until 2015, and in the months following its reboot, Donald Trump announced he would be running for president, a wave of celebrity deaths happened —including Prince, David Bowie, Alan Rickman, Harambe, and WWE star Chyna—and then of course, there was Brexit. (There was also a spate of “killer clown” incidents.) It felt like suddenly the world had gone mad, and people began questioning if the reason why could be found in the labs beneath Geneva.

The second shutdown, LS2, happened between 2018 and 2021, and saw the machine wake up to a world defined by Covid restrictions, vaccine passports, QR codes, AI panic and a growing sense that everyday life had become more digitized and controlled.

The reasons for the shutdowns are valid. Despite conspiracist claims that they are staged to conceal desperate attempts to hold back legions of malevolent forces who have arrived uninvited from other dimensions—or time travelers from the future aiming to stop present-day scientists from accidentally deleting the universe—technology is evolving at a rapid rate and scientific tools need to be upgraded. “One of the changes we’re making is a bit like moving from an iPhone 4 to an iPhone 17—except it’s much more significant than that. It’s not just a simple upgrade. It’s a major leap in what the machine will be able to do,” explained Barney.

When CERN is next brought back online it’ll be 2030, a year already immersed in dystopian lore. Online, the UN’s Agenda 2030 has been recast as a blueprint for a world where we are reliant on digital IDs, live in smart cities, banned from international travel and eating red meat, forced into cashless economies, and left at the mercy of a fascist one-world government.

If that is how things play out, maybe we’ll start wishing that the CERN gang really could fire up the machine and take us somewhere less stressful—whether that’s the past, the future, another dimension entirely, or simply oblivion.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/conspira...shut-down/