KBGY 9 News Sadly Isn't Real

January 30, 2025

I hate to be someone who goes around ruining the fun for everyone else, but that's what I'm going to do here. Sorry!

A "news" account has been trending on TikTok that goes by the name of KBGY 9 News. The reason this account has been trending isn't because of some groundbreaking news reporting, but rather the lack of news. Instead of news reports; (did i use that symbol right) you will find memes, edits, and other shenanigans. The whole point is supposed to be a social media manager that is going crazy and making whatever. This illusion is made more prominent by the account's verified status. However, there has never been a KBGY 9 News channel.

Before I get any deeper into this, I want to say that this account isn't doing anything wrong. They aren't using their platform to spread misinformation or deceive people. However, there are people who are spreading information saying this account is a real news station, despite it not.

KGBY has an official website that increases the strength of this illusion. However, this is nothing more than a Wordpress blog, while most actual local news sites use a custom content management system (CMS). The website also features hardly any posts. And on top of all this, the logo featured on the website is completely different from the one on their TikTok page. And old pages on the Internet Archive show complete nonsensical news reports such as this one, which is almost entirely the ":3" face repeated over and over.

Some news videos have been posted to the account's TikTok page, however these are very edited mockups, not featuring anchors or original reporting. An example of a news report can be seen here:

@kbgy9

Vice President Kamala Harris speaks in front of a crowd in Georgia about abortion rights during a rally on September 20, 2024.

♬ original sound - KBGY 9 News

These reports seem to use the graphics packages used by local Fox stations. And most Fox local stations usually go by the name of "Fox ##", with the ## being a number, not a callsign. Not every local Fox station is like this, some still go by callsign.

With that being said, things similar to this happen a lot, however not for news channels. This is most common with radio stations, when things are changing behind the scenes. For example, KISS-FM played "Killing in the Name" on loop while going through corporate changes behind the scene. However, usually these bits don't last for more than a day.

Once again, there is nothing wrong with this account. However, I feel it's important to stop misinformation from spreading, even if it is objectively funny.