Climate change conspiracies are spreading rapidly during UN's COP26 event

Conspiracy theories that promote climate-change skepticism and denial spread rapidly across the internet ahead of the United Nation's ongoing COP26 Climate Change summit in Glasgow, Scotland.

Amplified by bots and influencers, a large volume of climate change denial content spread on social media starting in June, according to researchers at Blackbird.AI. The technology firm's platform uses machine-learning algorithms to scan millions of posts across mainstream social networks — including Twitter, Telegram, fringe sites and others — and, aided by human analysts, identified four major climate denial trends targeting U.S. and European climate-change policy. 

Much of that content used mechanisms that were also effective in amplifying COVID-19 disinformation and vaccine hesitancy, said Blackbird.AI CEO Wasim Khaled.