Pakistani company apologizes for directing Dubliners to non-existent Halloween event | Ireland

A Pakistan-based company has apologized to Dubliners after a “human error” on its events website led to thousands of people turning out on the Irish capital's main thoroughfare for a non-existent Halloween parade.

Footage from Thursday evening showed crowds of people on both sides of O'Connell Street waiting for what was believed to be a procession of giant Halloween dolls made by one of Ireland's best-known theater groups, Galway performance company Mácnas.

Filmmaker Bertie Brosnan said: “I was there filming for 40 minutes. From Parnell Square West – on both sides of the street – people were packed five to ten and lined up around the corner to the tower. Thousands were there. The Luas [tramline] was completely closed on both routes.”

The crowd had come to watch the event, which was listed as taking place on the My Spirit Halloween website. As confused crowds were dispersed by gardaí who told them that no such parade would take place, they suspected a scam or a seasonal ploy.

But the company behind the website now says the fake incident was neither. Instead, it was a simple human error.

The website incorrectly announced that the Mácnas parade would take place on Thursday between 7pm and 9pm after a member of its team cut out the notice for last year's event and pasted it into this year's calendar.

The site, which aggregates content from around the world, was one of the highest-ranked Google Halloween listings in the days leading up to October 31, and the post about the parade was shared widely on social media.

The Pakistan-based man behind the website has since apologized, saying he was “depressed” and “embarrassed.” “We are very ashamed and very depressed and very sorry,” Nazir Ali told the Irish Times.

“It was our mistake and we should have checked again to make sure it happened. But newspapers report that we posted it intentionally and that is very, very wrong,” Ali said.

After event attendees noticed the error, it sparked a wave of amusement on social media – but also warnings about the dangers of misinformation and AI deepfakes.

Some joked that there should be a “parading commission” like Northern Ireland. Belfast journalist Allison Morris said on social media she had “laughed at the fake parade story” but it showed “how easy it is to spread misinformation”.

One user on

Social Democrat TD Gary Gannon – an MP – said it showed the power of misinformation and deepfakes. He pointed to a deepfake of Taylor Swift supporting Kerry politician Michael Healy-Rae.

“That was pretty funny, but suddenly when it gets a little more serious and people, for example, publish AI pictures of me saying something that I would never say, that contradicts my own values, then that's it something that's not right, too far from the horizon,” he told RTÉ.