Thousands of pounds accidentally donated to wrong charity in #nomakeupselfie blunder

It’s raised more than £8 million for Cancer Research – but thousands of people who jumped on the #nomakeupselfie bandwagon accidentally donated to the WRONG charity.

In a blunder caused by texting typos, some people accidentally donated to charity Unicef – or nearly ended up adopting a polar bear.

Although Cancer Research UK didn’t deliberately start the campaign, the charity jumped on the bangwagon and urged people to text ‘BEAT’ to 70099.

However those people who posted a photo without makeup and texted ‘DONATE’ to the same number mistakenly donated to Unicef as the charity has sole use of the texting shortcut.

"Unicef believes this error has occurred due to those interested in donating to the #nomakeupselfie campaign sharing the text keyword 'DONATE' - rather than the keyword 'BEAT' - and the text number 70099, which has then been repeated across social media,” Mike Flynn, director of individual giving at Unicef UK, told the BBC.

“DONATE to 70099' is an SMS keyword and shortcode combination that Unicef have sole use of, specifically for any members of the public who contact us and wish to donate to us via SMS."

The charity believes it was a ‘genuine mix-up’ and is working with Cancer Research UK to transfer over the funds that should have been sent to it in the first place.

"We are now working closely with all parties involved to ensure that this doesn't happen again in the future,” he said.

But in an another texting blunder, those whose autocorrect changed ‘BEAT’ to ‘BEAR’ accidentally enquired about adopting a polar bear from WWF.

The automatic reply from the wildlife charity said: “Thank you for choosing an adorable polar bear. We will call you today to set up your adoption."

But no funds were taken because a human operator would have called them back to arrange the adoption of the polar bear.

“When we realised there was a lot of interest in a campaign we weren't presently running we made sure our automatic text message response let the sender know their text had gone awry,” said Kerry Blackstock, WWF's director of fundraising.

"We wish Cancer Research UK every success in their campaign and their goals, polar bear selfies are harder to come by, though, as far as we are aware, none wear make up."

Did you post a no make-up selfie? What do you think of the craze?

[The #nomakeupselfie campaign: Are people missing the point?]

[Celebrities post photos without make-up]