Breaking Bad season 6 isn’t happening: A hoax story found its way into Google News

Better Call Saul is the closest you're getting to new Breaking Bad content

We’ve had to debunk Breaking Bad season 6 several times now (it isn’t happening guys, Walt is deader than dead), but you could be forgiven for falling for this latest hoax story.

An article entitled ‘Vince Gilligan Announces Breaking Bad Season 6; Begins Shooting December 2015 - NBC News’ found its way into Google’s ‘In the news’ segment on Wednesday, which cited the publication as ‘NBC’.

In fact, the article was a “satirical” one (disingenuous term for hoax clickbait) from fake news website NBC.com.co. I'd link to it, but don't want to give them the clicks.

It’s pretty appalling that Google let a non-reputable source masquerade as a major news organisation, and it’s probably due to the fact that its search algorithm gives preferential treatment to widely-shared stories, which a supposed announcement of a new season of the world’s biggest show certainly was.

This isn’t the first time it’s happened, with the same website last week fooling people into thinking Yelp was suing Comedy Central’s South Park for $10 million.

It wasn’t only Google that fell for the Breaking Bad hoax, NBC employees did too:

Bloomberg recently reported that Google has started handing over control of its search algorithm to an artificial intelligence system, which could also be a factor here.

Recode asked Google for a comment but has yet to hear back.