Washington Post reporters got an eyebrow-raising surprise when calling the White House this week: some phones labeled the number as “Epstein Island.”
“It was not a wrong number,” the outlet reported Friday. “That’s what the phone displayed when some Washington Post journalists called the White House switchboard.”
The strange label appeared on some Android devices, particularly Google Pixel phones, while iPhone users saw no name at all. After being alerted, Google said the issue stemmed from a manipulated listing in its system.
A company spokesperson said Google “identified what he referred to as a ‘fake edit’ in Google Maps that was ‘briefly’ picked up in the call identification feature of some Android phones.” The unauthorized edit has since been reversed, and the user behind it has been blocked for violating company policies, the spokesperson told the Post.
By Friday, calls to the White House switchboard no longer displayed any name on affected devices. A White House official said the issue “was external and unrelated to the White House systems.”
The bizarre glitch comes as the White House has faced ongoing questions about President Donald Trump’s past association with convicted child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, whose private Caribbean island has become widely known as “Epstein Island,” the Post noted.
“It’s unclear how long the ‘Epstein Island’ name was attached to the White House switchboard number or how many callers may have seen it,” the outlet added Friday.
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