Pinterest to implement climate misinformation policy on organic and ad content
Pinterest is creating an expanded policy to combat misleading climate change information, including conspiracy theories, across content and ads.
The announcement:
Ensuring that Pinners find ideas from trusted sources no matter what type of inspiration they are looking to discover on the platform —from how they cook, the way they shop, build their home, and how to live a more sustainable life —is important to Pinterest. That’s why today, Pinterest is rolling out a new climate misinformation policy to keep false and misleading claims around climate change off the platform. Our new policy makes Pinterest the only major digital platform to have clearly defined guidelines against false or misleading climate change information, including conspiracy theories, across content and ads.
As part of our Community guidelines on misinformation and disinformation, our climate misinformation policy removes content that may harm the public’s well-being, safety or trust, including:
- Content that denies the existence or impacts of climate change, the human influence on climate change, or that climate change is backed by scientific consensus.
- False or misleading content about climate change solutions that contradict well-established scientific consensus.
- Content that misrepresents scientific data, including by omission or cherry-picking, in order to erode trust in climate science and experts.
- Harmful false or misleading content about public safety emergencies including natural disasters and extreme weather events.
- All ads on Pinterest always have to comply with our Community guidelines. Additionally, we’ve updated our Advertising guidelines to explicitly prohibit any ads containing conspiracy theories, misinformation and disinformation related to climate change.
“Pinterest believes in cultivating a space that’s trusted and truthful for those using our platform. This bold move is an expansion of our broader misinformation guidelines, which we first developed in 2017 to address public health misinformation, and have since updated to address new and emerging issues as they come to the forefront. The expanded climate misinformation policy is yet another step in Pinterest’s journey to combat misinformation and create a safe space online,” said Sarah Bromma, Pinterest’s head of policy.
Searches for a greener life are rising on Pinterest. People are regularly turning to Pinterest to find ideas to incorporate sustainability into their entire lifestyle as searches for “zero waste tips” were 6X greater, “recycling clothes ideas” were 4X higher, “recycled home decor” increased by +95% and “zero waste lifestyle” increased by +64% compared to last year.*
Tackling issues like climate change or misinformation are complex, and requires the support and collaboration of an entire ecosystem. We have partnered with experts including the Climate Disinformation Coalition and the Conscious Advertising Network to help inform and develop our policy based on common misinformation themes they’re seeing across media platforms.
“Climate disinformation on digital platforms is a serious threat to the public support needed to solve the climate crisis. Pinterest has demonstrated great leadership by creating a community standard that includes a definition of climate misinformation, and we will continue to press all platforms for transparency and reporting on their actions. We encourage others to take note of Pinterest’s efforts to reduce climate change disinformation,” said Michael Khoo, climate disinformation co-chair at Friends of the Earth.
Source: Pinterest
