Crisis misinformation policy
Armed conflict
Overview
August 2022
We will take action on accounts that use X's services to share false or misleading information that could bring harm to crisis-affected populations.
A crisis is any situation in which there is a widespread threat to life, physical safety, health, or basic subsistence that is beyond the coping capacity of individuals and the communities in which they reside.
In times of crisis — such as situations of armed conflict, public health emergencies, and large-scale natural disasters — false and misleading information has a special capacity to bring harm to vulnerable populations. For these reasons, X is taking action to mitigate false or misleading information that has the potential to shape crisis dynamics and put vulnerable people in harm's way.
Currently, the scope of this policy includes but is not limited to international armed conflict. In these contexts, we're focusing on false or misleading information with the capacity to:
- Serve as a pretext for further aggression by armed actors, belligerents, or combatants,
- Trigger forced or anticipatory displacement of vulnerable populations, or lead to increased humanitarian needs,
- Negatively impact the ability of humanitarian protection, human rights, or relief organizations to provide assistance or access affected populations,
- Incite the targeting or surveillance of groups that can be identified based on their political, religious, ethnic, racial, or ideological affiliation or membership, or organizations and actors protected by international humanitarian law;
- Disrupt potential ceasefire agreements, peacekeeping operations, or diplomatic solutions to conflict or insecurity, among other matters.
We will update this page in the future as this policy expands to cover additional types of crisis events.
What is in violation of this policy?
Criteria
In order for conflict-related content to be considered violative under this policy, it must:
- advance a claim of fact, expressed in definitive terms;
- be demonstrably false or misleading, based on widely available, authoritative sources; and
- be likely to impact public safety or cause serious harm.
In the context of international armed conflict, we will take action on Posts that contain:
- 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 or groups;
- False information regarding international community response, sanctions, defensive actions, and/or humanitarian operations.
What is not a violation of this policy?
The following types of information/expressions are generally not violative of the policy:
- Strong commentary, opinions, and/or satire, provided these do not contain false or misleading assertions of fact.
- Information seeking (i.e. asking legitimate questions about an event in question), unless there are signals that the content represents a pattern of unhealthy behavior throughout the duration of a crisis.
- Debunking or fact-checking (i.e. calling attention to the claim in question to refute it). We allow for reproductions of false information or misleading content that is accompanied by analysis on if/how the content is misleading.
- News reporting — in most cases, fact-based descriptions of news-worthy events, even if those descriptions contain or involve misleading information, is not violative of the policy.
- Personal anecdotes or first-person accounts. We do not enforce the crisis misinformation policy on reports or first-person accounts of specific events or incidents that are otherwise un-verifiable. Note that other parts of Our Rules, including our policies about misleading and deceptive identities and platform manipulation, will also apply.
What happens if you violate this policy?
Account eligibility
We aim to reduce harm by limiting impressions on violative content on X. We will prioritize enforcement of highly visible Posts and Posts from high profile accounts, such as state-affiliated media accounts, verified, official government accounts, and/or Posts with a large number of impressions or engagements (Likes, Reposts, etc).
Warning notice
When Posts include misleading information related to an active international armed conflict, we may place the Post behind an interstitial advising viewers that the Post has violated our crisis misinformation policy. The remediated user will accrue 2 strikes under the strike policy. We will also disable the ability for others to Repost, like, or engage in other ways to prevent the spread of the misleading information, and the applied notice will link to Our Rules. We are doing this to preserve a record of the violative content on the platform while ensuring users are not directly exposed to harmful misleading information.
Reducing visibility of content
Finally, we may temporarily reduce the visibility of Posts or accounts that we believe with high confidence to be in violation of the crisis misinformation policy. If we determine that the accounts have continued to violate the policy, amplification limitations can be reapplied.
We may reduce visibility by:
- Making Posts and Reposts from those accounts ineligible for recommendation in certain parts of the X products (such as top Search results);
- Displaying Replies from the account in a lower position in conversations;
- Excluding Posts by the account itself in email or in-product recommendations.
Strike system
In instances where accounts repeatedly violate this policy, we will use a strike system to determine if further enforcement actions should be applied. Two notices applied within 30 days will result in a 12-hour account time-out. Three or more notices applied within 30 days will result in 7-day time-outs.
If you believe that your account was locked in error, you can submit an appeal.
Additional resources
Learn more about our ongoing approach to the war in Ukraine here, and about our other misinformation policies here.
Also, be sure to check out our range of enforcement options and our approach to policy development and enforcement.