TikTokers Flood Texas Abortion Whistleblower Website With Spam

TikTokers have put their internet savviness to good use amid the ongoing discourse around Texas’ new anti-abortion law.

Source: Charday Penn / Getty

To make the law that much more intrusive and just plain ridiculous, an organization called Texas Right to Life is urging citizens to submit anonymous tips on its website to help enforce the state’s anti-abortion law. In response, some TikTok users decided to spam the organization’s website with Shrek porn and other deliberately false information.

According to reports from NBC News, this valiant effort to troll the anti-abortion group was started by Victoria Hammett and Olivia Julianna, who both said they felt appalled by the recent legislation forbidding abortions once cardiac activity is detected, usually around six weeks of pregnancy. The law also allows private citizens, including people who live outside of Texas, to sue abortion providers or anyone else who helped someone get an abortion after the six-week limit for at least $10,000 per defendant.

“Texas has anonymously set up a system where you can report people who have gotten abortions,” Hammett, 22, said in a TikTok video on August 23, which has gotten more than 850,000 views. “Wouldn’t it be so awful if we send in a bunch of fake tips and crashed the site? Like, ‘Greg Abbott’s butt stinks.'”

As for 18-year-old Julianna, a native Texan, she knew she wanted to take action after learning about Texas Right to Life’s website.

“I found out about this website and thought, ‘We have to do whatever we can if they’re going to use the internet against us — the very people who were raised on the internet,'” Julianna said.

Soon after, Hammett posted her own video to raise awareness about the anti-abortion website, and their combined message gained traction quickly.

“The reaction has been amazing because people have felt really lost in regards to this anti-abortion legislation, and this was just one way of fighting back against this new law,” Hammett said.

According to Hammett, many TikTokers have deliberately sent fake information to the website, including tips with titles like “Greg Abbott farts” or “calls to abort Ted Cruz.” Some have even sent graphic images of Shrek, while others have reported excerpts from the 2007 film, Bee Movie, or Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight series.

To make things even more efficient, TikToker Sean Black, 20, said he used his own software engineering expertise to get a little more creative.

“I coded this bot that basically spams the website with fake submissions,” he told NBC News. “Once the bot is downloaded, it will automatically open the website, fill out the form with fake data that makes it look like you’re in Texas, submit it and then re-submit it, again and again.”

According to Black, more than 30,000 people have downloaded the bot as of Friday afternoon.

If there’s one thing Gen Z knows how to use, it’s the internet. Luckily, this time, they’re using it for good.