Conspiracy theories, fake news, deepfake… The fanciful billionaire Elon Musk has become, since the acquisition of X (formerly Twitter), one of the most prolific propagators of false information on his platform. According to NewsGuard, a start-up specializing in disinformation, the billionaire has directly relayed 17 false stories on his X account since the start of the year.
False or misleading information on the American elections published by the billionaire has amassed more than 1.2 billion views this year, notes the Center for Countering Digital.
No “notes” below his posts
The boss of Tesla, for example, claimed on his social network X that the Democrats encouraged illegal immigration to “import voters”. The billionaire also relayed, at the end of July, a manipulated video of American vice-president and Democratic candidate Kamala Harris. In total, nearly 50 posts discussing the elections published since January by Elon Musk have been identified by disinformation specialists as false or misleading, specifies the Center for Countering Digital.
Obviously, these messages do not display the usual “notes” below the posts – a tool promoted by X to combat disinformation – created by users to contextualize questionable or erroneous messages.
An amplifier of false information
But his role in spreading fake news goes well beyond his personal X account. A new analysis reveals that in addition to his own stream of false claims, Elon Musk frequently highlights other “super spreaders” of misinformation, helping them, through his engagement, dramatically increase their follower numbers.
Between January and June 2024, four of the five accounts with which Elon Musk interacted most frequently on 14 to 30%.
Elon Musk’s frequent engagement with these accounts therefore played a role in the growth of their follower numbers. “Elon Musk’s vast following on X makes his amplification of misinformation particularly significant. With 199 million followers, Elon Musk has 22 times the number of followers of the official White House account, nine times more than the Wall Street Journalthree times more than New York Times and twice as much as pop singer Taylor Swift,” recalls the site specializing in debunking.
