Four people in northern Thai Nguyen Province were arrested for spreading fake news about a female Samsung employee allegedly transmitting HIV to others. Nguyen Hong Quan, Nguyen Duc Nam, Nguyen Van Son, and Tran Van Tai, all 29 years old, have been detained by the police in Pho Yen City for distributing pornographic materials. Two others, Nguyen Le Ha and Nguyen Ngoc Huyen, are being investigated for the same charge but have been granted bail as they are raising small children.

Authorities reported that on July 25, Quan, a Samsung Thai Nguyen employee, saw a Facebook post about a leaked porn video involving a Samsung female employee, which falsely claimed that she had spread HIV to others. Quan later accessed a Kakaotalk group chat where he saw a post from Dang The Duy, an employee in Quan's department, which included a video of a man and woman having sex, accompanied by a message stating, "people said it's C.T.D."

That same night, Quan went to the company and accessed the firm’s internal network. He then joined a Zalo group chat composed of his high school friends, where an account named Nguyen Duc Nam posted a video with similar content to what Dang The Duy had previously shared.

Quan then used the company's internal account to obtain information about a woman named C.T.D. working at Samsung Thai Nguyen. He recorded her information, phone number, and portrait, and then shared this information in the Zalo group chat.

Although Quan deleted the information about 10 minutes later, it had already been shared further by others in the group chat.

The other accused individuals had also shared numerous pornographic videos in the same Zalo group chat, according to the investigation.

Authorities confirmed that the female Samsung employee in question did not have HIV, as verified by a hospital report. She reported the matter to local police, and Samsung Thai Nguyen also requested the police to investigate the rumors.

In July, a woman was fined VND7.5 million (US$300) for spreading false information on Facebook, claiming that a female Samsung Thai Nguyen employee had spread HIV to multiple men.