This month, when a narrative claiming Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy had secretly bought a $24 million fortress from the British royal household went viral on China’s Weibo social media platform, one thing attention-grabbing occurred.
A fake-news perform on the platform debunked it as misinformation.
Since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine in early 2022, Chinese language social media platforms have been filled with pro-Russia false claims and conspiracy theories, a few of which the Chinese language authorities has endorsed.
Influential Chinese language nationalist bloggers, in addition to Russia’s state media RT, recurrently put up and unfold misinformation on Weibo.
Lower than 20 hours after RT posted the misinformation about Zelenskyy, Weibo hooked up a fact-checking be aware to the put up.
Public criticism of Russian state media is uncommon in China, however the fact-check perform is a part of Weibo’s newest effort to control misinformation on the location.
Weibo rolled out the characteristic, referred to as Facet Be aware, final August. Facet Be aware permits certified customers to submit fact-checking notes on others’ posts for Weibo to assessment.
Over the previous few months, customers have added Facet Be aware to posts from high-profile Weibo bloggers and overseas government-backed accounts, together with RT and the U.S. Embassy in China.
Weibo has tried to look impartial when deciding what sort of misinformation to fact-check, debunking false claims from each liberal and nationalist influencers.
Nevertheless it has additionally used the characteristic to push Beijing’s speaking factors on worldwide points. To date, Chinese language authorities and state media accounts haven’t been topic to any fact-checking.
Weibo’s model of Group Be aware
In July 2023, China’s web regulator advised social media firms to crack down on false data.
” ‘Private media’ that create and publish rumors, fire up scorching societal subjects or matrix [linked cross-platform] publish and transmit unlawful or damaging data, making a vile affect, are all to be closed, included within the platform database of blacklisted accounts, and reported to the web data departments,” mentioned a memo from Central Our on-line world Administration of China.
A month later, Weibo, considered one of China’s greatest social media apps with a concentrate on information and present points, got here out with the Facet Be aware characteristic.
Just like the Group Be aware perform on X, Facet Be aware lets certified customers tackle the job of fact-checking, with Weibo getting the ultimate say on approval or rejection.
Different U.S. social media companies supply comparable options. Fb and Instagram supply “group requirements” and “group tips,” respectively, which flag posts containing disinformation.
However in contrast to these companies, Weibo itself decides which posts keep up.
The corporate says it selects certified customers from these with verified identities or excessive Weibo credit score scores and is steadily increasing the characteristic to incorporate extra customers.
Facet Be aware targets US Embassy
Since January, posts by the U.S. Embassy in China have been tagged with Facet Be aware at the least thrice.
A put up detailing U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s expressed issues about China’s non secular freedom obtained two notes, one accusing Blinken of getting “no regard for information.”
A February put up sanctioning 17 Chinese language firms for serving to Russia’s warfare effort in Ukraine acquired a be aware that included a Chinese language International Ministry spokesperson’s public remarks.
And a put up final month condemning Beijing for a collision between Chinese language and Philippine coast guard vessels acquired a Facet Be aware message from Shen Yi, a distinguished Chinese language worldwide relations professor with a robust nationalistic leaning.
Within the be aware, Shen accused the U.S. of spreading misinformation on a number of “world social media platforms” to “smear China’s nationwide picture.”
Chinese language authorities accounts immune
Most posts tagged with Facet Be aware belong to influencers, together with nationalist bloggers.
For instance, Shu Chang, who runs the favored nationalist account Guyan Muchan, noticed a Facet Be aware added to a put up final week claiming that schoolchildren within the U.S. must learn to use “bulletproof boards” in lecture rooms. The Facet Be aware clarified that the pictures have been from a hurricane self-protection train.
In recent times, nationalist bloggers like Shu have develop into a number of the most traffic-drawing opinion leaders on Weibo.
Eric Liu, who analyzes Chinese language censorship at China Digital Instances, says one should not learn an excessive amount of into Weibo fact-checking Shu’s put up.
“Lots of her stuff is not state narratives. She sensationalized it herself,” Liu advised VOA. “Weibo does not actually have to guard her. Plus, [fact-checking her posts] provides to the credibility of the Facet Be aware characteristic.”
Liu, who labored as a censor for Weibo and different Chinese language web firms earlier than transferring to the U.S., identified that Weibo has not used Facet Be aware to fact-check authorities accounts or false data from state media.
In a November put up, Weibo thanked customers for submitting Facet Notes.
“Ever since Facet Be aware went on-line, energetic participation from each Facet Be aware-er has successfully lowered the damaging affect of controversial content material and biased data, serving to all customers entry data that is more true and extra complete,” the put up mentioned.
However Liu does not consider Facet Be aware as a characteristic that actually offers customers the ability to control speech on the platform, as a result of Weibo stays the ultimate arbitrator of what notes could be added to what posts.
“Weibo’s Facet Be aware is not one thing that netizens can absolutely edit, because it’s nonetheless user-generated content material,” he mentioned. “Ultimately, it nonetheless must be reviewed by censors.”
Weibo didn’t reply to VOA’s request for remark.
Evie Steele contributed to this report.