False content about the war in Ukraine will be marked on Twitter 

On May 19, Twitter introduced a new «crisis misinformation policy», which stipulates that false content about the war in Ukraine will be marked with a special warning notice. This was announced by Twitter head of safety and integrity Joel Roth on his blog. 

«In times of crisis, misleading information can undermine public trust and cause further harm to already vulnerable communities. Alongside our existing work to make reliable information more accessible during crisis events, this new approach will help to slow the spread by us of the most visible, misleading content, particularly that which could lead to severe harms», – said Roth.

Warnings will be added to the following posts:

• False coverage or event reporting, or information that mischaracterizes conditions on the ground as a conflict evolves;
• False allegations regarding use of force, incursions on territorial sovereignty, or around the use of weapons;
• Demonstrably false or misleading allegations of war crimes or mass atrocities against specific populations;
• False information regarding international community response, sanctions, defensive actions, or humanitarian operations.

Strong commentary, efforts to debunk or fact check, and personal anecdotes or first person accounts do not fall within the scope of the policy.

They will prioritize adding warning notices to highly visible Tweets and Tweets from high profile accounts, such as state-affiliated media accounts, verified, official government accounts. 

Tweets with content that violate the crisis misinformation policy will be placed behind a warning notice that looks like this: «This Tweet violated the Twitter Rules on sharing false or misleading info that might bring harm to crisis-affected populations. However, to preserve this content for accountability purposes, Twitter has determined this Tweet should remain available».

«While this first iteration is focused on international armed conflict, starting with the war in Ukraine, we plan to update and expand the policy to include additional forms of crisis», – Roth added.

The policy will supplement Twitter’s existing work deployed during other global crises, such as in Afghanistan, Ethiopia, and India.

Twitter has been working on the policy since 2021. In developing this system, the team relied on the findings of international experts and human rights organizations. 

The social network defines crises as «situations of armed conflict, public health emergencies, and large-scale natural disasters».

Twitter has deleted or marked as unreliable more than 50,000 posts containing false information about the russian federation’s war against Ukraine.