Source: French to English Tester Published on: 2026-04-02
Source: The Conversation – in French– By Florian Dauphin, Sociologist, Senior Lecturer in Information and Communication Sciences, University of Picardie Jules Verne (UPJV)
On TikTok, YouTube, or Instagram, the “Epstein files” fuel conspiracy narratives, ranging from cannibalism to satanism. Paradoxically, the massive release of archives has not dispelled suspicions; it even seems to have strengthened them. Why?
On January 30, 2026, as part of theEpstein Files Transparency Act, the United States Department of Justice hasposted online3.5 million pages, more than 2,000 videos and 180,000 images related to the Epstein case — named after the businessman accused of organizing a network of underage sex trafficking, involving manyinfluential personalities.
Once uploaded into the digital space, these archives become a fragmentable, circulating material, susceptible to multiple reappropriations. And this dynamic is far from marginal. On March 16, 2026, the TikTok Creative Center ranked #epstein in 4th position among “News & Entertainment” hashtags in France over the past 120 days, with 18,000 posts. On Instagram, #epsteinfiles showed 456,000 publications. These indicators do not prove that all the content is conspiratorial. However, they do show the existence of an environment conducive to the viral reappropriation of the files. Therefore, the more numerous the archives are, the more they can be invoked without being truly verified.
Files as a source of authority
The “Epstein files” do not circulate only as a source of information. They also function as a resource of authority. Their mere invocation is enough to lend weight to a claim.
On the platforms, this logic fuels abusive associations, visual overinterpretations, and false attributions. Thus, the lips of certain personalities, such asEpsteinhimself orJack Lang, presented online as swollen, are interpreted as alleged signs of cannibalism.
TikTok post from the FasâTessy account,Provided by the author
Some content also directly attributes to the files revelations that are not contained in them. A publication shared on Telegram by the channel Les masques tombent, which has more than 57,000 subscribers, thus claims that “new documents related to Epstein reveal” that Leonardo DiCaprio allegedly consumed “child meat,” before inviting readers to consult the “uncensored continuation.”
Some images are also falsely linked to the “Epstein files” to support accusations of cannibalism: some involve the singer Lady Gaga although they actually come from aartistic performancedocumented during the Watermill Center Summer Benefit of 2013; the others are taken from afake horror movie trailer, then presented as the trace of an actual scene linked to the case.
Telegram Channel “The Masks Fall”,Provided by the author
This is where a decisive mechanism comes into play. Because the documentary mass is immense, heterogeneous, and difficult for the ordinary public to browse through, verification becomes costly. This practical difficulty creates a space conducive to approximations, shifts, and false attributions. The authority of the files therefore relies not only on their content but also on the fact that very few people can actually control the whole.
Files mobilized to reinforce preexisting imaginations
TikTok, YouTube, or Instagram play an important role here, not only because of the breadth of their reach but also because of the very form of the content that circulates there. The short format, rapid editing, assertive tone, and revelation logic favor spectacular statements, little contextualized but highly memorable.
Many videos rely on a rhetoric of revelation. They promise to expose what would be hidden, to make the files speak, and to bypass journalistic mediations. This framing gives the internet user the impressionto access a hidden truth, without going through the ordinary mediations of inquiry or verification.
These stories do not come out of nowhere. They reactivate already well-established conspiratorial imaginations, particularly those associated withQAnon, atPizzagateor to stories aboutadrenochrome, which portray pedocriminal, satanic, or predatory elites. The “Epstein files” do not createout of nothingthese accounts. They give them a new appearance of credibility, by allowing the claim that they are anchored in real documents.
OneTikTok video, published in early February 2026, clearly illustrates this shift. Its author claims, against a backdrop of dramatic music, that “the Epstein files reveal that we are not governed by human beings, but by something else,” before mentioning “satanic rituals,” child sacrifices, cannibalism, and then “entities” said to feed on “the agony of the victims.”
In a different register, avideo published on YouTubeclaims to rely “solely on official documents posted online by the United States Department of Justice,” FBI reports, emails, and investigation files. This staging of the documentary investigation gives the statement an appearance of seriousness. But it is accompanied by an escalation between established facts, ambiguous clues, and extreme hypotheses: satanism, eugenics, ritual infanticides, cannibalism.
The case of the “beef jerky” is revealing. In several email exchanges made public by the United States Department of Justice, Epstein appears as a fan of dried meat. The video mentioned above, claiming to rely solely on official documents, repeats an interpretation already present in other online content: it suggests that the expression would not actually refer to dried meat, but a hidden code to talk about human meat, or even children, even whileno evidence supports this interpretation.
The files are then no longer read only for what they say, but are used to lend credibility to already available narratives.
The “Epstein files” serve here as a starting point for a comprehensive narrative that goes far beyond their content. They are no longer used to document a case, but to lend credibility to a worldview in which the elites are possessed by demonic forces.
Massive transparency can also fuel suspicion
One of the paradoxes of the Epstein case is therefore the following: making documents public is not enough to produce a shared truth. In a context marked by distrust towards institutions and the media, transparency can even reinforce suspicion, especially when it appears incomplete. This is the case with the Epstein files, some of whose documents have beenredacted (names have been concealed), and others simplynot broadcast.
Avideo published by France 24debunks several fabrications linking the Epstein case to scenes of cannibalism, by recontextualizing viral images falsely connected to the files. But some of the comments from internet users under the video interpret this work not as a restoration of facts, but as additional proof of concealment. Some thus accuse the channel of wanting to “whitewash this elite” or to “throw dust in the eyes,” while others believe that “the more you deny, the more we realize the horror.” The denial then itself becomes an element of suspicion.
The “Epstein files” thus emblemize how judicial archives, once circulated online, can cease to be merely documents to be consulted and become instruments for legitimizing misleading, even extremely speculative narratives. The issue is therefore not only to verify the facts, nor even tounderstand why certain stories receive such adherence, it is also better to support the circulation of these archives, to contextualize them, to explain what they show and what they do not show, and to offer accessible reading guides, for example in the form of educational summaries or interactive tools allowing the verification of the authenticity of a document cited online.
In the era of mass digital archives, transparency is not enough. Without mediation, it can itself become a new infrastructure for conspiracy narratives.
Florian Dauphin does not work for, advise, hold shares in, receive funds from any organization that could benefit from this article, and has declared no other affiliation than his research institution.
–ref. “Epstein Files”: when transparency fuels conspiracy narratives –https://theconversation.com/epstein-files-when-transparency-feeds-conspiracy-narratives-278814