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Facebook will debunk recurring myths posted on its site about climate change, a move similar to the information push it has tried around COVID-19.
The update marks a quick shift in a few months from when CEO Mark Zuckerberg in May defended unchecked speech from politicians on the platform. Zuckerberg said then that he didn’t feel “Facebook or internet platforms in general should be arbiters of truth.”
The company FB, -1.53% said it is adding a section to its climate-change information hub that will feature facts from George Mason University, the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication and the University of Cambridge to identify and debunk misinformation.
The page starts with the factual treatment of the idea that recent global warming is caused by humans, not natural events, based on NASA findings. And that too much carbon dioxide in the atmosphere causes global warming, which is damaging to plant life on earth, according to the Yale Program.
Facebook will add information labels to posts about climate change that direct people to its climate change information hub.
Facebook introduced this hub in September, shortly after the company removed a report with erroneous claims that Oregon wildfires had been started by Antifa members. That report had gone viral on the social network.
The company said it will now expand this hub to users in Belgium, Brazil, Canada, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Mexico, the Netherlands, Nigeria, Spain, South Africa, and Taiwan. The feature has been available in the U.S., U.K., France and Germany.
Facebook shares are up 25% over the past year, compared to a 16% gain for the S&P 500 SPX, -0.44% over the same timeframe.
