It was a LARP started on 4chan by an anon claiming to have Q clearance (rumored to be the highest clearance available). Qanon posted some cryptic stuff that people took as gospel and even the most basic predictions based on available information were treated as something special that only Qanon could possibly know.

Nothing that shows evidence of a special clearance has been posted, but Qanon became a new religion to them.

Some of the people who believe in Qanon do actual research, but they attribute it all to Qanon, so that solidifies their belief that this is all real and someone highly intelligent within the Deep State is their friend and ally.

One of the good things to come of it is that people are actually talking about the pedophiles in high positions who want to destroy countries so they can rule the world. They were reposting Chrissy Teigen's pedo posts, so Twitter got scared and shut down the whole thing.