Full Global Witness report: file:///Users/marcmorano/Downloads/Global_Witness_Annual_Report_September_2022%20(1).pdf
Page 18 Excerpt:
SOCIAL MEDIA AND CLIMATE DISINFORMATION
Our investigation in March 2022 revealed how Facebook can lead users down a rabbit hole of climate denial and misinformation, eventually leading to outright conspiracy theories. We simulated the user experience of an individual liking pages such as “Net Zero Watch”, an organisation countering climate policy and linked to the UK Conservative MP Steve Baker. We found that immediately after liking this page, the user was recommended “Climate Depot”, a US-based outlet run by Marc Morano and part of CFACT, a group that calls human-induced climate change “a myth”.
In an overwhelming majority of cases, a similar pattern continued throughout the simulation leading the user to see content that includes the myth that climate change is a hoax, that describes the UN as an “authoritarian regime” that has less credibility than “Bugs Bunny”, and accuses the “green movement” of “enslaving humanity”. As the simulation went deeper, Facebook began to recommend other conspiracies, such as the chemtrails theory which claims that condensation left by planes contains chemical agents that control the weather. These findings fly in the face of the commitment Facebook has said it has to promoting genuine climate science.
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