YouTube to provide conspiracy theory videos with Wikipedia passages

YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki announced at the Sxsw event in Austin, Texas, that the platform wants to provide videos about conspiracy theories with excerpts from Wikipedia articles, among other things, in order to prevent the spread of disinformation.

According to CNBC, Wikipedia is not the only source for the passages, but also other “fact-based sites.” Over the next few months, conspiracy theory videos should be accompanied by small chunks of text from those sites about the event in question alongside the image. That only happens with videos about theories that generate “considerable discussion”, such as about chemtrails or about the moon landing.

YouTube will use a Wikipedia list of well-known internet theories, writes The Verge. Topics must then be added over time, the YouTube CEO announced. By adding information, viewers should be informed that information about a particular event is present.

CNBC cites a recent example where a shooting at a school in Parkland, Florida, led to the theory that one of the survivors was an actor. A video spreading this theory had cropped up in the YouTube trending video category at the time. It is unclear what would happen in such a case.

Images via CNBC