Donald Trump, who has called climate science “a giant hoax” and “bullshit”, is identified as a key influencer, “whose logical fallacies, unfounded claims and cherrypicking of findings were heavily” reposted by other social media users, including many bot accounts. The report says Russian intelligence has used troll farms to disseminate disinformation about climate change.
However, Jensen said the problem was deeper than social media. “Alliances of industry and conservative thinktanks actually target misinformation at the key people who will be making decisions. Those links are particularly worrisome because it’s something approaching a conspiracy.”
In the European context, rightwing populist parties are “actively contravening climate science”, the report says, including the AfD in Germany, Vox in Spain, and the National Rally in France. Media outlets with conservative or rightwing political ideologies give priority to and amplify denial, scepticism and conspiracy theories regarding climate change, the report says.
Measures to fight climate misinformation include regulation to improve the moderation of content by social media companies, as with the EU Digital Services Act, and requiring fossil fuel companies to make standardised declarations of their emissions. Jensen said some legal cases against purveyors of climate misinformation were already under way. In the longer term, improved climate education would enable citizens to identify misinformation.
Jensen also said more research was needed as the studies to date were overwhelmingly on English-language misinformation and western nations, with, for example, just one study out of the 300 focused on Africa.
