The Digital Landscape of Climate Misinformation in the UK: 2023 & 2024

A new CAAD analysis of over 30,000 posts on X, Facebook and Telegram sheds light on the scale of climate misinformation taking place in the UK. Analysing posts between July 2023 and July 2024 inclusive, we build further evidence for the evolving tactical playbook used by accounts in and out of the UK to exploit weaknesses in platform design. Misinformation on climate science, policy and activism frequently eclipse pro-climate narratives in terms of reach and engagement. False and misleading narratives include content that:

• Denies the existence of climate change or casts doubt on climate science.
• Links climate policy to false conspiracy theories.
• Exploits the cost of living crisis in order to attack renewables.
• Attacks public figures.
• Normalises violence against climate protesters.

Accounts on these platforms are constantly evolving their tactics to game the system, including:

• Piggybacking political announcements and attacking public figures to capitalise on bi-partisan sentiment.
• Using the news cycle to stay relevant.
• Exploiting algorithms’ preference for high-traction posts through upcycling the most effective content over and over.
• Taking advantage of the ‘borderless’ nature of social media by seeding misinformation about the UK from outside.
• Including climate misinformation as a hot button issue within a broader suite of conspiratorial or usually politically conservative talking points

This activity slows the implementation of climate policy in the UK, a country whose public on the whole wants faster climate action. In doing so, account owners that receive money from the fossil fuel industry continue to benefit from the resultant extension of the fossil fuel economy.Other account owners may monetise their activity in other ways, through direct advertising revenue, revenue-sharing schemes with platforms, or merchandising of their brand. In one example, some of the highest traction posts in our dataset originate from an account that sells T-shirts on its website with slogans including “you are the carbon they want to reduce”, “CO2 is plant food not pollution” and “net zero emissions will make net zero difference to the world temperature of planet earth”.In light of these findings, CAAD calls for greater political action to protect data access for researchers who are documenting online harms, plus an increase in tech companies’ accountability for the monetisation of climate misinformation – both by the accounts that exploit the platforms, and the platforms that profit from the activity themselves.