In the U.S., a 21-year-old college graduate created a website featuring fake election polls
The anonymous website Median Strategies, which circulated fake pre-election polls in Wisconsin, Nevada, and California, was created by 21-year-old recent college graduate Rahil Prakash. The Guardian reported this, citing an interview with him and an analysis of domain registration data.
Median Strategies ceased operations and retracted the poll results after a Los Angeles Times reporter asked questions about the site’s activities. In an unsigned statement on the website, the project was described as a short-term social experiment designed to test whether fake polling data could enter the political information landscape and spread without independent verification.
Prakash stated that he created Median Strategies on his own, using artificial intelligence to develop the website. According to him, he wanted to test how easily false polls could spread. As of the morning of August 20, Median’s account on the social network X had about 20 followers, and it began posting on August 9.
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Median Strategies’ data was already being used in political discussions. Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass cited a poll showing her leading another candidate by more than 10 percentage points. The California Post also cited the results, and a popular poll aggregator on X shared data regarding Nevada. At the same time, a number of reputable organizations did not include the Median poll in their aggregated data because they could not verify its methodology.
The website also published a fake poll claiming that Francesca Hong was leading other candidates in the Democratic primary for governor of Wisconsin by more than 20 points. Hong subsequently lost the primary. Another fake poll showed Nevada Governor Joe Lombardo with a five-point lead ahead of the general election in November.
The American Association of Political Consultants condemned the project, stating that publishing fabricated poll data under the guise of independent research constitutes a deception of voters, the media, and election campaigns. A statement from Median Strategies also claimed that the project received no funding or compensation. Prakash denied that he had traded in the futures markets after the data was published.
