The Weaponisation of Environmental Information in the Era of Fake News

Nov 12, 2020 | Doug Weir
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Environmental disaster? War crime? Ecological terrorism? A polarised and omnipresent social media is turbocharging the manipulation of environmental information during conflicts. While the use of environmental information for propaganda purposes isn’t new, what is new is the pace and volume of claims. From Gaza, to Ukraine and Yemen, distortion, manipulation and misinformation are rife. In this extended blog, Doug Weir and Dr Nickolai Denisov take a look at how and why environmental information gets distorted during conflicts, why it’s important to challenge digital propaganda and how it might be done.