A common propaganda tool, false documentation is often used by management groups and totalitarian governments for four basic reasons: Perhaps the best illustration of false documentation is Nazi Germany, where the authorities falsified documents for all four reasons.
The third is to refuse to document an actual event, thereby exonerating the instigators for lack of proof.
The practice of false documentation rests on the fallacy, promoted by management organizations and governments, that whatever has been written down is unquestionably true.
As folklorist Jan Harold Brunvand points out, when a story or a claim appears in print, it gains an air of authority.
Many people are skeptical of spoken rumors, but few doubt the veracity of stories appearing in the news media.