Musk and X are epicentre of US election misinformation, experts say

WASHINGTON - False or misleading claims by billionaire Elon Musk about the US election have amassed two billion views on social media platform X in 2024, according to a report by non-profit group Centre for Countering Digital Hate.

The platform is also playing a central role in enabling the spread of false information about the critical battleground states that will likely determine the outcome of the presidential race, said election and misinformation experts on Nov 4.

A spokesperson for X said the company’s Community Notes feature, which lets users add additional context to posts, is more effective at helping people identify misleading content than traditional warning flags on posts.

Government officials and voting rights advocates in the US have warned about election-related misinformation while urging social media platforms, including X, to take steps to remove any false information about the vote.

Since taking over the company formerly known as Twitter, Mr Musk has curtailed content moderation and laid off thousands of employees. He has thrown his support behind Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, who is locked in an exceptionally close race against Democratic candidate Kamala Harris.

Mr Musk’s massive reach with nearly 203 million followers helps enable “network effects” in which content on X can jump to other social media and messaging platforms such as Reddit and Telegram, said Dr Kathleen Carley, a professor of computer science at Carnegie Mellon University and expert on disinformation. “X is a conduit from one platform to another,” she added.

At least 87 of Mr Musk’s posts in 2024 have promoted claims about the US election that fact-checkers have rated as false or misleading, amassing two billion views, according to the Centre for Countering Digital Hate.

Mr Musk’s political posts have amassed 17.1 billion views since he endorsed Trump in July – over twice as many views as all the US political campaigning ads that X has recorded in its political ads disclosure dataset in the same period, the non-profit group added.

Among posts by Mr Musk that were described in the report as false or misleading were those claiming “voter importation” such as “a triple digit” rise over the past four years in undocumented immigrants in battleground states, as well as posts questioning “the integrity of voting”.

Last week, the same non-profit group said the crowdsourced fact-checking feature of Community Notes was not countering false claims about the US election.

In Pennsylvania, one of the seven key swing states, some X users have seized on instances of local election administrators flagging incomplete voter registration forms that would not be processed, falsely casting the events as examples of election interference, said Mr Philip Hensley-Robin, Pennsylvania executive director at Common Cause, during a press briefing on Nov 4.

Common Cause is a non-partisan organisation that promotes accountable government and voting rights.

Some X accounts implied “that there was voter fraud, when in fact, we know very clearly that election officials and election administrators in all of our counties were following the rules and… therefore only eligible voters are voting”, Mr Hensley-Robin said.

Cyabra, a firm that uses artificial intelligence to detect online disinformation, said on Nov 4 that an X account with 117,000 followers played a key role in helping spread a fake video purporting to show Pennsylvania mail-in ballots for Trump being destroyed.

X’s spokesperson said the platform took action against many accounts that shared the video.
REUTERS