The biggest scandal in the “Do you want to become a millionaire” quiz happened in September 2001.
The biggest scandal in the history of the popular quiz “Do you want to become a millionaire?”but also television in general happened in 2001. In September 2001, the British Charles Ingram (59) answered the quiz’s final question correctly, but in the end he didn’t get anything because it turned out that he cheated in front of the audience, the host and the viewers. And how did the former soldier cheat?
His friend was sitting in the audience Tekven Vitok who coughed every time the correct answer was mentioned and that’s how Charles came into his millions. Ingram’s wife Dajan she advised him to give up on a smaller amount so that no one would suspect anything, but he did not do so.
Host Chris Tarrant didn’t notice any suspicious behavior while asking questions, but was later told by a staff member that he thought the contestant was cheating. The million pound question was: – What is the name of the number one followed by one hundred zero? The answers offered were: A) Googol, B) Megatron, C) Gigabit or D) Nanomole. The correct answer was under A), Google, although the scammer first stated that he had never heard of it, a in the end he decided on exactly that answer, which was still strange to the presenter.
The fraudsters were reported by Larry Whitehurst, a fast-fingered competitor, and the case ended up in court. Ingram claimed he did not encourage, listen or observe any coughing, but video evidence refuted his claims. Charles, his wife and Ingram eventually dserved suspended sentences and had to pay a fine of £115,000.
“Ingram had never heard of a googol, but he was still willing to take a risk. It doesn’t make any sense,” wrote fans of the show, and they also pointed out that he was very unsure of most of the other answers and had very funny explanations for the answers offered. This case got its own series called “Quiz”. Series author James Graham is a big fan of the “Want to be a millionaire?” quiz.
“At the time, like everyone else, I was obsessed with the case. I couldn’t believe that someone was capable of trying to steal a million pounds in front of cameras and an audience,” said James, who went on to create three episodes of the series. . First is the preparation for the quiz, then the performance itself and finally the trial and all that the fraud brought with it.
(WORLD)