Blogger fined £240,000 for faking brain cancer

AN AUSTRALIAN blogger who wrote a book about how she defeated brain cancer has been fined £240,000 for making false claims.

A Melbourne court found Belle Gibson guilty of the deception after she published a cookbook and smartphone app in 2013 asserting that she overcame cancer naturally, through alternative treatments and diet.

In 2015 she confessed to an Australian magazine that she lied about the diagnosis. It also emerged that she failed to make donations she had publicly pledged to charity.

“If there is one theme or pattern which emerges through her conduct, it is her relentless obsession with herself and what best serves her interests,” Justice Debra Mortimer said in handing down the fine for misleading and deceptive conduct.

Gibson, 25, who did not attend the hearing, made £245,000 from her book and social media businesses, promising much of the earnings to charity.

Justice Mortimer said people bought her app because they believed the profits were going to a good cause.