An investigation by the BBC Global Disinformation Unit has found that more than 80 people were killed across six African countries between October 2025 and July 2026 after false rumours spread that they had used sorcery to make men's genitals shrink or vanish. The panic, fuelled largely by videos circulating on TikTok and Facebook, has led to mob attacks and lynchings of people accused of "genital theft" after alleged victims claimed a mere touch had caused their genitals to disappear. The phenomenon draws on long-standing superstitions about witchcraft but has spread with unusual speed and lethality because of social media amplification.

The current wave appears to have begun in the Democratic Republic of Congo last year, echoing similar claims there in 2008, before spreading to Burundi, Zambia, Tanzania, Mozambique, Angola, Malawi and Kenya. In Zambia a woman was lynched in March after being accused, triggering fear across the border in Tanzania, where mechanic Boniface Mgala was dragged from a restaurant and badly beaten in April, leaving him with permanent scars and a limp; his friend was killed in the same attack. Witnesses in the border town of Tunduma described further violence, including a man being beaten and set alight, in scenes captured on video and viewed more than 100,000 times online before police intervened.