SEC Probes Report About Apple CEO's Heart Attack

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is examining a teenager’s motives for posting a report on CNN’s iReport.com that said Steve Jobs had suffered from a heart attack.

A couple of weeks ago, an article appeared on iReport.com, which said Apple CEO and founder, Steve Jobs had been rushed to hospital following chest pains. Once Apple had denied the rumor, the article was removed. However, for the short period it was live and online, it spread like wild fire and as a result of the tale, Apple stocks dropped a significant amount.

Bloomberg reports (citing “two people with knowledge of the matter “) that the Securities and Exchange Commission is conducting a probe into why the teenager posted the story. While they preferred not to be named because the probe is not public, the Commission had not uncovered any evidence that the teenager had benefited from the 5.4 percent decline in the Cupertino company’s stock on October 3. A CNN spokeswoman said the station was unaware of the age or identity of the person behind the post.

According to Bloomberg, the fake heart attack report cut Apple’s market value by at least $4.8 billion in the first hour of Nasdaq Stock Market trading. The shares recovered a bit, closing down 3 percent once Apple spokeswoman Katie Cotton said the report on iReport was absolutely not true.

While the incident puts a black mark on the idea of citizen journalism, CNN has said it doesn’t plan to review its procedures for placing content on iReport meaning it’s possible we could see more posts like the one on October 3. The full post is pasted below for reference.

“Steve Jobs was rushed to the ER just a few hours ago after suffering a major heart attack. I have an insider who tells me that paramedics were called after Steve claimed to be suffering from severe chest pains and shortness of breath. My source has opted to remain anonymous, but he is quite reliable. I haven’t seen anything about this anywhere else yet, and as of right now, I have no further information, so I thought this would be a good place to start. If anyone else has more information, please share it.”