Facebook has begun adding informational labels to posts about climate change to target users (File)
Facebook advertisers have been promoting false and misleading claims about climate change on the platform in recent weeks, just as COP26 was underway.
Days after Facebook’s Vice President of Global Affairs, Nick Clegg, advertised the company’s efforts to combat climate misinformation in a blog during the Glasgow summit. To begin with, conservative media network Newsmax ran an ad on Facebook calling man-made global warming a “hoax.”
The ad, which has several versions, has garnered more than 200,000 views.
In another conservative commentator, Candace Owens said, “it’s clear that we have to trust our new authoritarian government” on climate science, while a US liberal-thinking organization runs advertising how “modern apocalypse” have been predicting climate crises for decades.
Newsmax, Owens and Daily Wire, which paid for advertising from Owens’ site, did not respond to a request for comment.
Facebook, which recently changed its name to Meta, does not have a specific policy on climate misinformation in ads or unpaid posts. Last month, Alphabet’s Google said it would not allow ads that conflict with the scientific consensus on climate change on YouTube and other services, although it will allow content that discusses climate change. false statements.
Facebook generally doesn’t remove misinformation in posts unless it determines that they cause imminent real-world harm, like misinformation surrounding COVID-19 has done. The company said it downgraded posts rated as false by third-party fact-checkers (of which Reuters is one) and banned ads with these removed claims. It said advertisers who repeatedly post misinformation could face restrictions on their ability to advertise on Facebook. It exempts politicians’ ads from fact-checking.
When asked about the ads’ climate misinformation, a company spokesperson said in a statement: “While ads like these run across multiple platforms, Facebook provides more a layer of transparency by making them available to the public in our Ad Library for up to seven years after publication.”
UK-based consultancy InfluenceMap, which has identified misleading Facebook ads running from a number of media and consulting organizations around COP26, also detected fossil fuel companies and lobbying groups spent $574,000 on social and political issues Facebook ads during the summit, which resulted in more than 22 million impressions and included content promoting the effort. protect their environment in what InfluenceMap describes as a “green wash”
An ad paid for by the American Petroleum Institute revolves around the natural landscape as the company advertises its efforts to tackle climate change, while BP America runs an ad detailing support for the policies. climate-friendly neon green text.
“Our social media posts represent only a fraction of the dramatic investments our companies make every day in groundbreaking methane capture technologies, improving hydrogen and accelerate carbon capture,” API said in a statement, adding that the oil and natural gas industry was committed to reducing emissions. BP said in a statement that it is “actively advocating for policies that support net zero, including pricing carbon, through a range of transparent channels, including social media advertising. “
Oil and gas companies placed ads in a variety of other media before and during the COP26 summit, including on podcasts, newsletters, and through television commercials. In Europe, Greenpeace and other environmental groups last month called for a ban on advertising and sponsorship by oil and gas companies.
Facebook has begun adding informational labels to posts about climate change to direct users to the Climate Science Center, a new hub with events and quizzes that it says has more than 100,000 visitors. everyday.
When asked in an interview that aired this week at the Reuters Responsible Business USA 2021 event, where he thinks Facebook is still flawed on climate issues, Chief Technology Officer Mike Schroepfer said, “Clearly. Obviously, there’s concern about people sharing climate misinformation on Facebook.”
“I wouldn’t say we have it right at any point,” he said. “We’re constantly re-evaluating the state of the world and our role, starting with trying to allow people to free speech and then intervening when there’s harm that we can’t. prevent.”
He didn’t directly answer why Facebook didn’t ban all climate misinformation ads but said it “didn’t want people to profit from misinformation.”
EMPLOYEE INQUIRY POLICY
The company’s approaches to climate misinformation and skepticism have sparked employee debate. Discussions on its internal message boards showed employees discussing how it should handle climate misinformation and flagging its cases on the platform, such as in a post posted in January, where a staff member said they found “outstanding results of apparent misinformation” when they searched for climate change in the ‘Watch’ section of its video.
The documents are in a cache of disclosures sent to the US Securities and Exchange Commission and Congress by whistleblower Frances Haugen, a former Facebook product manager who left in May. Reuters is part of a group of news organizations that can view the documents.
In comments on an April post highlighting Facebook’s commitment to reducing its own environmental impact, including reaching net zero emissions for its global operations by 2020. Last year, an employee asked if the company could start sorting out and removing climate misinformation and hoaxes from its platform.
Two outside researchers who work with Facebook on climate change efforts told Reuters they would like to see the company approach climate misinformation with the same proactiveness on COVID-19, which Facebook has handled during the pandemic.
“It needs to be,” said John Cook, a postdoctoral fellow in the Center for Climate Change Communications Studies at Monash University, who is consulting for Facebook on climate misinformation work. be dealt with with the same degree of urgency. “It is said to be more dangerous.”
(Except for the title, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from an aggregated feed.)
