Beloved Actor, 95, Responds to Rumor He Has Brain Cancer

William Shatner is shutting down rumors of a recent health scare as the Star Trek icon warns his fans to be vigilant when it comes to misinformation scams.

The beloved actor, 95, took to social media on Thursday to shut down a fake report from a Facebook page posing as a wedding planning service that shares various AI-generated images and stories about him — including that he was “battling for his life” due to a nonexistent brain cancer diagnosis.

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“My Daughter came over to tell me her daughter heard that I had brain cancer,” Shatner wrote alongside a photo of himself relaxing outside. “She took this photo and sent it to me to upload to prove I’m not ill.”

“The people who are ill are those that are spreading these ridiculous stories,” he continued. “I’m fit as a fiddle. You don’t have to worry.”

In another post, Shatner disavowed the page for “using AI to create horrible fake news stories about me,” writing, “They have created stories that say I have stage 4 brain cancer, was in some kind of fight with Erika Kirk and that I’m dying. All their stories are monetized. Most of the stories use an AI image of me. Facebook Support will not remove the page.”

He continued, “None of these stories are true but they apparently seem genuine enough for fans to repost them across social media and send messages of support to me and my family all while the culprits behind the account make money.”

Shatner pointed out that this kind of situation is the “downside of AI” and “yellow journalism,” opining that while AI can be “a wonderful tool in the right hands; it can be used as a weapon in the wrong hands.”

As of Thursday afternoon, the Facebook page referred to by Shatner was no longer accessible, and the social media platform’s parent company, Meta, told Entertainment Weekly, “This page has been removed for violating our policies.”

Last month, Shatner confirmed at the 53rd annual Saturn Awards that he had to undergo surgery to repair his shattered right shoulder after falling off one of his horses late last year.

Shatner told the press at the time that while he was feeling “old, tired, and kind of hurt” at the time, he would be getting a “new type of shoulder operation” in which surgeons “put the ball in the socket and the socket in the thing, and you come out 10 hours later, and you’re pain-free. So that’s what I am meandering towards.”