Dylan Bettencourt
Masses of fake votes threatened the integrity of the recent Fat Bear Week competition in the United States.
The fat bear competition is an annual event where online users get to vote for their favourite bear during the season the animal picks up weight to survive the winter.
However, the two-day tournament was threatened by a voting scandal during the semi-final when a flurry of fake votes came in from users with fake emails and suspicious IP addresses.
The organisers said they picked up the fake votes during the closing stages of the voting for the final two bears, Business Insider reported.
The semi-final between the bear named Holly and bear 747 came close to being jeopardised with the votes having to be investigated.
“747 was leading in votes for the whole day and by quite a substantial amount,” Amber Kraft, the Interpretation and Education Program Manager for the National Park Service told Rolling Stone.
“When there were just a few hours of voting left we noticed that 435 Holly received over 9,000 votes in a very short period of time.”
Holly, a blonde-furred female bear, claimed victory in the competition in 2019 but she faced the bear named after the Boeing 747 aeroplane this time round.
“Most bears recognize they cannot compete with him physically and they yield space upon his approach,” the tournament wrote on their website.
The male bear is said to weigh around 635kg and is recognised as one of the largest brown bears in the world.
After a review of the votes, 747 emerged victorious with 37,940 votes while Holly only managed 30,430 votes.
In the final two days later Bear 747 claimed overall victory when he faced newcomer Bear 901.
The tournament is also used as a platform to raise awareness of bear’s health during the winter season.
“We hope that the awareness that Fat Bear Week brings will grow into caring and action in whatever way makes the most sense for each individual,” programme manager Kraft added.
Pictured above: Bear 747
Source: @People
