Misinformation is a proven danger — and it poses a serious threat to the public support that’s needed to solve the climate crisis. But misinformation can be hard to spot, and even more difficult to report and correct.
This how-to guide shares tips and tools for fighting climate misinformation, plus step-by-step instructions for identifying misinformation and reporting it on social media platforms.
The top 5 ways you can fight climate change myths
- Ignore conspiracy theories on the Internet. Don’t give them more life by sharing them and spreading them further.
- Don’t repeat the lie. If you want to address a false claim, don’t repeat the lie itself, which can actually end up amplifying it.
- Make a “truth sandwich.” Combat myths with the truth, then correct the lie without repeating it, and finish with more truth.
- Don’t use partisan language or sources. They can cause people to tune out completely, which is the opposite of winning.
- Sign up and speak up. Use credible sources and scientific studies to contradict the lies with facts, and sign up for the Anti-Misinformation Brigade so we can notify you when your help is needed.
How to identify a suspicious post
If something catches your eye that doesn’t seem quite right — especially articles or posts that provoke strong emotions like anger or fear — run through this list of questions before sharing it online:
- Do you recognize the source? Does it reference one that you can easily find?
- Does the information in the post seem believable?
- Is it written in the style you’d expect from a professional news organization?
How to verify articles and social media posts
If you answered no to any of the questions above, you can use any of these sites to double-check the facts:
- Climate Feedback is a worldwide network of scientists sorting fact from fiction in climate change media coverage.
- PolitiFact is part of the nonprofit Poynter Institute, focused on politics.
- Fact Checker is run by the award-winning, fact-checking team at the Washington Post.
- Snopes.com is one of the oldest and largest fact-checking sites online.
- Lead Stories was co-founded by a registered Independent and a registered Republican, so it might be more trustworthy for conservatives.
Other tools that can help you verify content
The following resources can give you near-instant feedback or help you do additional digging:
- NewsGuard offers a paid browser extension and app that tells you if a site is reliable as you browse online news.
- Google Reverse Image Search (beginner) and Metadata2Go.com (advanced) show you the history of an image and how it has been used.
- InVID (advanced) is a tool that helps you check the reliability and accuracy of video files on social media.
How to report misinformation on social media
Here are step-by-step instructions for getting social networks to take notice of misinformation:
Step-by-step instructions:
1. Click on the three dots in the upper right-hand corner of the post.
2. At the bottom of the list that appears, click on “Report post.”
3. Choose “False information,” and then whatever category you think the post falls under. If you don’t know, choose “Something else.”
Step-by-step instructions:
1. Click on the three dots in the bottom right-hand corner, below the video, next to the “thumbs up”/“thumbs down” icons and the share function.
2. At the top of the list that appears, click on “Report.”
3. No “misinformation” reason is offered, so choose “Spam or misleading,” then “Scams or fraud” in the dropdown list. At the bottom right-hand corner, click “Next.”
4. Here you can ask YouTube to do more to combat climate misinformation. Suggested text you can use: “Please detox your algorithm, add ‘climate misinformation’ to your borderline-content policy and correct the record by working with independent fact-checkers to inform users who have seen or interacted with this video.”
X has removed a feature that previously allowed users to report misinformation directly. X now has a community-driven content moderation program known as “community notes.” These notes add context (such as fact-checking) under a post.
If you have an X account that’s at least six months old, with a verified phone number and no recent violations of X’s rules, you can sign up to be a contributor who can submit notes on misleading posts, and vote on what notes will be publicly appended to a misleading tweet.
Join the Anti-Misinformation Brigade
Sign up and we’ll notify you of dangerous new lies — and arm you with the facts, sources and studies to debunk them and stop their spread. Make your voice count!