Twitter Labels Tweets Mentioning ‘Oxygen’ and ‘Frequency’ as Coronavirus Misinformation

Twitter’s Chinese coronavirus “get the facts” system appears to be broken, as the platform is automatically applying the fact-checking label to random tweets that contain combinations of the words “frequency” and “oxygen.”

Twitter’s “get the facts” label is a system by which the platform affixes a label to certain tweets, directing users to “authoritative sources” (usually a collection of links from the mainstream media, or an official Twitter “moment”).

Twitter has previously used this label to cast doubt on empirically valid concerns from President Trump about mail-in voting fraud.

The platform’s system is today suffering a major malfunction, with random tweets about “oxygen” and “frequency” being tagged with “get the facts about COVID-19” messages.

Clicking on the “get the facts” link takes users to an official Twitter page informing users that “no, 5G isn’t causing coronavirus.”

The fact that the labels are being applied automatically to tweets suggests that the platform is attempting to use an algorithm to detect claims deemed to be in need of an official “fact check” from Twitter. Clearly, the platform’s artificial “intelligence” is experiencing some technical difficulties. Last month Twitter faced a similar issue when it tried fighting against 5G conspiracy theories on the platform.

Breitbart News reached out to Twitter about the issue, but has yet to receive a response.

Update — A Twitter spokesperson provided the following statement to Breitbart Tech: “Labeling Tweets that may contain misleading information continues to be an iterative process. Given the global spread of misinformation and disputed claims around 5G and COVID-19, we prioritized algorithmically labeling tweets with that information. As we improve this process to be more precise, our goal is to show fewer labels on unrelated Tweets.”

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Allum Bokhari is the senior technology correspondent at Breitbart News.