Artificially generated images depicting a sinister version of the fictional character "The Cat in the Hat" have been circulating on social media, placing the figure in nighttime street scenes of Ledegem (a small municipality in the West Flanders province of Belgium). The trend, which originated in the United Kingdom and Ireland this summer, involves creators deliberately making AI-generated images blurry or grainy to pass them off as genuine. Ledegem's mayor Bart Dochy has urged residents to report such content to police, warning that while the images are fabricated, they risk making people — particularly young people — afraid to go outside, and a media psychology researcher at KU Leuven has noted that the use of real, recognisable locations makes AI-generated hoaxes more psychologically potent than earlier online scare trends such as the "killer clown" phenomenon of a decade ago.