traue keiner Statistik, die du nicht selbst gefälscht hast

German

Etymology

Unknown. Literally, “do not believe any statistic that you haven't forged yourself". While commonly attributed to Winston Churchill, there is no proof and the proverb is completely unheard of in the English-speaking world. It was later hypothesized that the mistaken attribution was intentionally created as Nazi propaganda to discredit Churchill. The first use of this proverb is attested in 1946.

Proverb

traue keiner Statistik, die du nicht selbst gefälscht hast

1. always take statistics with a grain of salt

Further reading

• Traue keiner Statistik, die du nicht selbst gefälscht hast on the German Wikipedia.Wikipedia ^de