Someone, or several someones, are posting purported videos from this year's Myrtle Beach Marathon on YouTube as a way to redirect people to another site where they are asked to download potentially harmful software.
Marathon audio-visual coordinator Doug Kelly of Carolina Film Group said if people go looking for marathon videos on YouTube, they should beware of any that ask them to go to another site to see the complete film.
When you click on one of the phony videos, you'll see a still photo of the run's logo with a message that says "Due to copyright issue and You Tube TOS, we can't upload full video here!" and asks viewers to click on another site.
The faux videos also have a box of hovertext that says "youtube quality suck."
Kelly said he did not click on the link for fear of downloading a virus or other problem, and The Sun News staff followed suit.
Kelly said marathon organizers have begun an official YouTube channel where real, authorized marathon videos will be gathered and posted over the coming days, and where, in the future, people will be able to go and get news and information about the annual event.
One other clue Kelly said should let people know the videos aren't real is that the country of origin that labeled on them is not local.
"It comes from Indonesia or Grenada," he said. "Why they chose the Myrtle Beach Marathon I don't know, but something is fishy in Denmark."
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