Man Behind Website That Listed Fake Halloween Parade Says It Was ‘Just a Mistake’: ‘We Are Highly Embarrassed’

Mar. 15, 2025

Thousands of spectators gather for Halloween parade hoax in Dublin.Photo:arturmartins/X

arturmartins/X

The man behind the viral AI website that listed afake Halloween paradeleading to thousands of people gathering along the streets of Dublin on Thursday, Oct. 31, says it was “just a mistake."

Nazir Ali, owner of the website MySpiritHalloween.com, toldWiredin an interview published on Nov. 1 that “this was just a mistake” and insisted he and others who work on the site are not scammers.

He admitted that ChatGPT was used to help them write the article in question, but not in its entirety. He claimed artificial intelligence was involved in about 10 to 20 % of the article’s development, while “we were 80 % involved.”

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“We apologize to our Irish brothers,” Ali told the outlet. “We are highly disappointed, highly embarrassed, and honestly, we are feeling bad.”

Ali toldthe BBCthat a writer used a listing from a previous parade when creating the post, and was “unaware” that the parade was not occurring.

Aerial view of Dublin.Guven Ozdemire/Getty/Stock Image

Guven Ozdemire/Getty/Stock Image

The website owner claimed the intentions of those who work on MySpiritHalloween.com “are very pure,” and suggested they tried their best to produce “authentic content.”

“No one in Ireland informed us that this parade was not going to happen,” he said, per the BBC. “If they told us before the evening we would have removed it.”

Ali said the listing was changed as soon as they learned of the mistake. “We even wrote ‘this has been canceled,’ but it was too late,” he toldWired.

Ali did not have a direct answer when the outlet asked if the website’s content creators will continue to rely on AI to assist them with their work. But he admitted they “should double check” and “triple check” their work moving forward.

“We don’t actually want to mislead any of our Irish brothers,” Ali said before reiterating, “This was just a mistake.”

Ali toldWiredthat MySpiritHalloween.com, which he expects MySpiritHalloween will be deranked on Google as a result of the debacle, has only been operating for about three months.

Police, meanwhile, were able to clear the streets of Dublin after crowds formed for the non-existent parade.

source: people.com