The photo displaying a tiny elephant being held by a woman does not show a live elephant. The photo is almost certainly of a developing fetus since elephants at birth still stand at over 2.5 feet tall which is substantially larger than the elephant in the photo.

A reverse image search reveals a personal photo album with more photos of the elephant revealing it to be, as we suspected, a dead fetus.


The Internet, and social networking sites like Facebook, are perfect platforms for spreading untruths, misinformation, rumor and propaganda. Thousands of inaccurate, exaggerated, deceptive or just plain false messages are circulated every single day.

For the anti-scam community to successfully tackle this plethora of false rumours, it is important that anyone who uses the Internet be able to identify false rumours and fully understands the possible consequences of spreading false information.

We have a two part blog post that helps provide this information. Part 1 deals with how to spot and debunk Internet rumours and Part 2 deals with the reasons why you should never circulate false information.

Additionally if you have fallen for this rumour or have Facebook friends that have, you can join our growing Facebook page here.