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Sean Black: TikToker goes viral for creating bot to troll anti-abortion website

Sean Black took the initiative after the Texas Right to Life group made a site to allow people to report on women who seek abortions after six weeks

A TikTok creator has gone viral on the internet for creating a bot that flooded a Texas website with fake reports of people seeking abortions after six weeks of pregnancy. Sean Black took the initiative after the US Supreme Court upheld the Texas abortion ban and then an anti-abortion organization — Texas Right to Life group — launched a website for people to report suspicions that friends, family, colleagues, or neighbors may be accessing abortion care.

“Okay hear me out. What if somebody very technical, very hands on set up a bot that automatically sends the request to the website. Oh wait, it was me, I did that,” Black, who goes by the name @black_madness21, said in a video that’s had 1.4 million views. In another video, he claimed that his IP address was banned after his creation sent around 300 fake stories, memes, and bogus reports. But he did not stop there as he made an iOS shortcut that let people send false reports to the site, which garnered him a lot of applause on TikTok as well as Twitter.

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About his venture, Black told Motherboard, VICE’s tech site, “To me the McCarthyism era tactics of turning neighbors against each other over a bill I feel is a violation of Roe V Wade is unacceptable. There are people on TikTok using their platform to educate and do their part. I believe this is me doing mine.”

A TikTok user commented, while praising Black, “Do you prefer king, queen, ruler or perhaps techromancer the almighty.” Another one said, “What did we do to deserve you.” “You are officially the reason I have faith in humanity,” a person added.

A tweet, “They are our future and I’m very happy to see them so engaged in politics already. Is there a better way? Idk man, they seem to be on it.” Another one stated, “Good to hear every one is on this. This is just a start Corruption in the hands of supposed justice is no Justice. Our sovereignty as independent women is at stake. My body my CHOICE.” A person asked, “Where can I donate to keep this kid and his group continuing?” 

A second user suggested, “if 1,000,000 people a day filled out the captcha box it would still overwhelm them."

“SEAN is UPDATING THE SITE....FOLLOW HIM @ black_madness21 Sean Black Following Message 293 Following 55.2K Followers 1.1M Likes I am back and ready to hand out some Ls,” the third one added.

Meanwhile, other people also condemned the Texas Right to Life group. A 22-year-old TikTok creator, Hammett, said, “Texas has anonymously set up a system where you can report people who have gotten abortions. Wouldn't it be so awful if we send in a bunch of fake tips and crashed the site? Like, 'Greg Abbott's butt stinks.’” Julianna, 18, a native of Texas, added: “I found out about this website and thought, 'We have to do whatever we can if they're going to use the internet against us — the very people who were raised on the internet.’”