Hideo Kojima’s studio says it will consider ‘legal action’ after fake assassin posts circulate

Hideo Kojima’s recreation studio has issued a response after faux posts circulated throughout social media and information retailers that misidentified Kojima because the murderer of former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. In a tweet, Kojima Productions says it “strongly condemns the unfold of pretend information and rumors that convey false data” and “will contemplate taking authorized motion in some instances.”

On Friday, a person shot and killed Abe throughout his speech at a political marketing campaign rally. Police captured the shooter on the scene who was later recognized as 41-year-old Tetsuya Yamagami.

Shortly after the incident, an web troll on 4chan posted a racist picture that hyperlinks Kojima’s face with that of the shooter (by way of PCGamer). One other person replied to the submit with three further footage of Kojima that present the Metallic Gear and Loss of life Stranding designer in a Soviet cap, in addition to posing with photos of Argentine revolutionary Che Guevara.

French comic Georges Jordito later reshared these photos on Twitter as a part of a now-deleted “satirical” submit that stated the wrongdoer was Japanese soccer star Keisuke Honda. Nonetheless, Damien Rieu, a far-right French politician related to the nation’s nationalist motion, took it critically and tweeted out images of Kojima with textual content translated to: “The far-left kills.” As identified by Vice, the photographs had been then picked up by Greek and Iranian information retailers that mistakenly used the photographs of their protection of the assassination.

Rieu has since deleted his tweet and issued an apology to Kojima, noting “I naively took a joke for data.” The Greek outlet, which included a picture of Kojima in a broadcast, took its section off of YouTube, whereas the Iranian newspaper has additionally corrected the picture it utilized in its report.