Facebook plans to flag and debunk misinformation about climate change
Article from The Blaze
After debunking misinformation about COVID-19 and the 2020 presidential election results, Facebook will now be the arbiter of truth about climate change. The social network will begin flagging and debunking climate change myths.
Facebook released a statement Thursday stating that the social media platform will “add informational labels to some posts on climate,” and direct users to the Facebook Climate Science Information Center, a resource that provides “science-based news, approachable information and actionable resources from the world’s leading climate change organizations.”
Previously, Facebook rolled out its Voting Information Center in August and the Coronavirus Information Center in March to combat news the company deemed to be misinformation.
“To debunk the myths with current and specific facts, we’ve brought in climate communication experts from the George Mason University, the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication, and the University of Cambridge,” Facebook said.
“The spread of damaging falsehoods endangers the level of international cooperation required to prevent catastrophic global warming,” said Sander van der Linden of the University of Cambridge. “Facebook is in a unique position to counter the circulation of online misinformation, and the new climate ‘mythbusting’ section is an important step toward debunking dangerous falsehoods.”
“Developing rebuttals based on the best-practices from communication research is an important step toward countering online misinformation,” said Dr. John Cook of George Mason University.
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