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Twitter has always been a hot spot for climate change misinformation.
Under new owner Elon Musk, misinformation about a warming planet is spreading at a dizzying pace.
Claims casting doubt on climate change are circulating on the social media platform, according to a study of climate-related conversations shared exclusively with USA TODAY.
The new report echoes recent research showing a surge in climate misinformation since Musk bought the company in October.
According to Advance Democracy, a disinformation research organization, the number of tweets containing climate denial terms such as “climate hoax”, “climate hoax” and “climate hoax” more than tripled in 2022, up 300% from from 2021
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The review found that the most shared tweets were not tagged, despite Twitter’s policy to do so.
Twitter’s media relations department, which was gutted after Musk bought the social media platform, did not respond to USA TODAY’s request for comment.
Musk openly encouraged attacks on mainstream science
“Musk has openly encouraged attacks on mainstream science with his posts, revived previously banned anti-science accounts, and altered the site’s algorithm in a way that significantly limits the reach of leading climate messengers.” – Michael Mann, director of Penn Center for Science, Sustainability & the Media at The University of Pennsylvania told USA Today.
According to John Cook, a research fellow at Monash University.
These attacks by bots and critics have driven some climatologists off the platform, says Michelle Amazeen, director of the Communications Research Center at Boston University.
Daniel Jones, president of Advance Democracy, says his research group has also found increases on TikTok and YouTube.
“Last year, social media companies announced additional steps to combat the spread of climate change misinformation on their platforms. Despite these steps, Advance Democracy found that in almost all cases, the spread of climate change denial content has increased over the past year, and in many cases dramatically,” Jones told USA Today.
The wave of misinformation alarms climate scientists
Climate change is one of the most controversial debates on social media.
Scientists say the warming of the planet is primarily due to human activities that emit heat-trapping greenhouse gases. The effects include higher sea levels, droughts, wildfires, increased rainfall, and wetter hurricanes.
Climate science deniers are using social media to challenge the overwhelming evidence of human involvement in climate change. “Sensational, controversial, emotionally suggestive content” overshadows scientific findings on most platforms, Amazeen said.
Climate scientists have been calling on social media companies for years to identify and remove posts and videos that deny, question, or downplay the effects of climate change. Despite the company’s policy of labeling content that denies climate change, social media posts often lack warning labels or links to credible information.
Cook says he fears that the accelerating spread of climate misinformation will further undermine public understanding of climate change and public trust in science and scientists.
How climate change got so hot on Twitter
The spike in climate-denying content on Twitter began in July, when President Joe Biden unveiled plans to fight climate change with executive action, as stated by Advance Democracy. The number of tweets containing terms denying climate change exploded in November during the UN climate conference.
According to Advance Democracy, three of the top 10 most retweeted English-language Twitter posts that mention climate change suggest that climate change does not exist or that it is a narrative pushed by the media.
While Twitter has not changed its policy on climate change misinformation, which is owned by Musk, the number of tweets rejecting climate change science has skyrocketed, according to a study by the City, University of London for The Times newspaper.
Much of this increase is linked to the hashtag “climate hoax”, which accounts for around 40% of tweets containing climate skeptical language, up from 2% before 2022, researchers Max Falkenberg and Andrea Baronchelli found.
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Musk fired the sustainability team at the Twitter account @TwitterEarth, which was launched in November as the “voice of COP27” ahead of the start of the UN climate conference.
“Climate denial on Twitter was already a dumpster fire; now it looks like a liter of gas has been poured into it,” climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe told The Times.
YouTube, TikTok and Facebook and climate change denial
Youtube: According to Advance Democracy, one in 10 searches for phrases related to climate change denial included an information panel with scientific facts about climate change.
When searching for four common climate change denial phrases, YouTube showed climate change denial ads, including a video denying the role of human activity in climate change, according to a study.
YouTube says the Climate Change Information Panel, which provides climate change context from third-party sources, now appears at the top of search results for these queries.
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“In addition, we have removed a number of the ads discussed in the report in line with our advertising and monetization policy regarding climate change denial,” YouTube spokeswoman Elena Hernandez said in a statement.
ICT: Videos with seven hashtags related to climate change denial were viewed at least 4.9 million times more in 2022 than the previous year, according to a study.
None of the hashtag searches have been flagged as a potential source of disinformation, Advance Democracy said.
Three of the hashtags were removed after USA TODAY asked TikTok for comment.
Facebook: The number of posts with slogans related to climate change denial fell by 14%. But, said Advance Democracy, none of the most popular posts denying or downplaying the risks of climate change are linked to Facebook’s Climate Information Center.
