It looks like a troupe of pranksters has trolled just about an entire Virginia shopping mall by convincing shoppers one of its members was a celebrity.

The jokesters at Chill Hill Media didn’t even bother to change the name of Thomas Elliot, who played the “celebrity.” Instead they just gave him a fake security detail and started spreading the word that he had appeared in movies like ‘Spider-Man’ and ‘The Hunger Games.’ Watch the hilarious social experiment unfold below.

So it turns out if you have a friend stick a wire in his ear and pretend he’s protecting you from throngs of fans, mall security will shut down stores so you can shop. Well, that’s good to know for next year’s holiday rush.

And what about all those girls who scream and squeal for an actor named ‘Thomas Elliot”? Oh. My. God. Do they not realize that Google can be accessed from the very same phone that they are frantically using to send messages to their friends about their great “celebrity” encounter.

This was a very bad day for humanity. But, hey, at least “Thomas” got a couple phone numbers.

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