Elon Musk vows to fix X's fact-check feature, claims Ukraine's Zelensky ‘gamed’ posts
The "community notes" feature, allows users to attach content to posts that could contain misinformation to debunk them.
Elon Musk on Thursday vowed to fix social media platform X's “community notes” feature after claiming that it was being "gamed" by Ukraine's President Volodymr Zelensky.
In a post on X itself, he said, “Unfortunately, @CommunityNotes is increasingly being gamed by governments & legacy media. Working to fix this.”
Also Read: Ukraine's Zelensky bats for ‘strong ties’ after US envoy meet amid tensions with Donald Trump
Musk's move comes after ties between US President Donald Trump and Ukraine's President Zelensky soured, following Trump's accusation that the Ukrainian President was a dictator and had started the war against Russia.
Trump had also claimed that Zelensky had only a four per cent approval rating in his own country, a number which could not be verified.
Also Read: Macron defends Zelensky as Ukraine's legitimate leader after Donald Trump brands him ‘dictator’
After Donald Trump's comments, users ranging from journalists to officials from various governments took to X to defend Zelensky and Ukraine using the community notes feature which allows users to add content to a post to debunk misinformation.
A survey carried out this month by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology showed that Zelensky has a 57 percent approval rating.
Musk responded to this saying, "It should be utterly obvious that a Zelensky-controlled poll about his OWN approval is not credible!! In reality, he is despised by the people of Ukraine, which is why he has refused to hold an election."
He also defended Donald Trump's comments and added that Zelensky was running a "massive graft machine feeding off the dead bodies of Ukrainian soldiers."
"He knows he would lose in a landslide, despite having seized control of ALL Ukrainian media, so he cancelled the election. In reality, he is despised by the people of Ukraine," Musk wrote.
The community notes feature was rolled out in 2022 by Elon Musk after he purchased the social media platform. Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram is also looking to replace its professional fact-checkers with such a feature.
