Available in | English |
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Founded | 2007 [1] |
Headquarters | Passau, Germany [2] |
Owner | Futurebytes GmbH & Co. KG [2] |
URL | disclose |
Disclose.tv is a disinformation outlet [8] based in Germany that presents itself as a news aggregator. [2] [6] It is known for promoting conspiracy theories [13] and fake news, [19] including COVID-19 misinformation [3] [2] [6] and anti-vaccine narratives. [22]
The website was created in 2007 as a conspiracy forum focused around content such as UFOs and paranormal phenomena. In 2021, it rebranded itself as a news aggregator on its social media platforms and website. Disclose.tv pushes far-right content, conspiracy theories and misleading information together with real news taken from other sources frequently without attribution, and platforms hate speech, including Holocaust denial and neo-Nazism, on its message groups. [2] [6] [23]
Archived versions of Disclose.tv were found as far back as March 2007 by Logically, a British anti-disinformation organisation. In its initial form, the website operated as a forum focusing on user-generated content discussing topics such as UFOs, paranormal phenomena and conspiracy theories. [2] [6] The website's name references the concept of "disclosure" in the UFO community, referring to the time they believe the government will confirm the existence of aliens and release information about them. [2]
In April 2012, Disclose.tv announced a redesign of its website. [24] During the 2010s, Disclose.tv's content became more political, with users' posts on the site casting doubt on the Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections and criticising "social justice warriors", [2] [6] which Logically said was indicative of "the right-wing undercurrent of the community". [2]
In 2019, Disclose.tv removed its user-written articles and switched to primarily hosting forums; the website presented some of the forum posts as news articles on its social media accounts. [2] In September 2021, it removed its old versions and cleared out its Twitter, Facebook and YouTube accounts, and announced to its users that it would be operating exclusively as a news website. Around the same time, the website published news articles that were backdated to September 2020, and many of which were plagiarised from a combination of reliable sources and other conspiracy theory websites. [2] [6]
In January 2022, after Logically sent a request for comment during its investigation of the website, Disclose.tv published an unsigned statement [25] claiming to have never heard of Logically, stating it had "lost sight" of the hateful content being posted on its Discord channel despite claiming to have moderators and bots searching for such posts, and apologising for the examples of plagiarism listed in the investigation. The statement also targeted Logically reporter Ernie Piper by name. [2] [6] Logically noted that Disclose.tv had blocked many members of its editorial team on Twitter prior to the request for comment, despite claiming to have never heard of Logically. [2] Piper said that the statement, part of which was described as being "ironic and mocking in tone", was "not a normal way for a media organization to respond to critical coverage", and added that it was "alarming" and "in and of itself a threat" that Disclose.tv had published his name to its followers. [6]
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As of January 2022, Disclose.tv has social media accounts on Twitter (1 million followers as of 5 November 2022 [26] ), Telegram (438,000 followers), YouTube (12,000 followers) and Facebook (3 million followers), as well as the far-right platforms Gettr (612,000 followers) and Gab (199,000 followers). Between September 2021 and January 2022, Disclose.tv also maintained a Discord server. [2] [6] Disclose.tv's content has been promoted by QAnon conspiracy theorists [27] and shared on COVID-19 misinformation groups on Telegram. [28]
Miro Dittrich, a senior researcher for the Center for Monitoring, Analysis and Strategy (CeMAS), a German extremism monitoring agency, said that Disclose.tv "is an exception in terms of its reach" in relation to other fringe websites, and in how it is "trying to portray itself as not being a German outlet" and reusing American far-right sources' talking points. Dittrich and Stephan Mündges, the head of the Technical University of Dortmund's Journalism Institute, said that the biggest threat from outlets like Disclose.tv is their ability to present conspiracy theories, disinformation and misleading stories as factual news. Mündges noted, "They call themselves 'alternative media.' And not everything they publish is completely false, there can be a true story that is then given a strong slant in a certain direction." [6]
In January 2022, Logically reported that Holocaust denial, neo-Nazism and other forms of hate speech were flourishing on Disclose.tv's Discord and Telegram groups, which included users displaying the swastika and sharing the neo-Nazi propaganda film Europa: The Last Battle on its Telegram group. [2] [23] Logically reporter Ernie Piper explained, "They had a disclaimer saying 'no Nazi BS,' but were at best negligent and at worst freely allowing extreme anti-Semitism on their channels." [6] Promoting or platforming Holocaust denial is illegal in Germany, with a punishment of up to five years in prison. Following Logically's request for comment, Disclose.tv closed its Discord server. [2] [6] Germany's Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) said that Disclose.tv was "known" to them, but did not comment further on the extent to which they were monitoring its channels. [6]
Disclose.tv presents itself as a news aggregator on its social media platforms, promoting conspiracy theories and misleading information together with real news taken from other sources frequently without attribution. It has misrepresented past events as having taken place in the present, such as reporting on a March 2020 curfew in Bavaria in October 2021. [2] [6] Logically noted that over half of Disclose.tv's eight most popular tweets featured no attribution as of January 2022, and stated that the website's continued uncritical coverage of conspiracy narratives and UFOs since its September 2021 relaunch revealed its links to pseudoscience and conspiracy theories. [2]
Dittrich stated that the website often creates content "that doesn't look like it's conspiracy-driven" and is occasionally shared by "apolitical people or people on the left who don't know its true purpose". Mündges said that it was not very common for a Germany-based website to be producing content in another language for an international audience, adding: "It is more common that items from the English-language media, for example the 'Stop the steal' narrative, are taken and translated into German". [6]
In 2012, Disclose.tv published a story titled "List of All FEMA Concentration Camps in America Revealed", which was shared by American far-right conspiracy theorist Alex Jones. [29] In 2015, skeptic Brian Dunning listed Disclose.tv at #6 on his "Top 10 Worst Anti-Science Websites" list, calling it "the National Enquirer of the 21st century. Aliens, UFOs, mermaids, Planet X, ghosts, ancient mysteries... anything you'd expect to find in a supermarket tabloid, you can find on the pages of Disclose.tv." [30]
In August 2016, Disclose.tv published an article falsely claiming that Edward Snowden was pronounced dead by his girlfriend in Russia. [16] In September, Disclose.tv claimed that NASA had admitted to being in contact with aliens and had not formally announced the information due to believing that everyone was already aware of it; Snopes traced the source of the claim to Waterford Whispers News, an Irish satirical news website. [31]
In 2017, PolitiFact included Disclose.tv in its list of fake news websites. [18] [32]
In May 2018, Disclose.tv published an article claiming that vaccines contain "cancer enzymes". The fact-checking website Health Feedback noted that the "enzymes" referred to in the article seemed to be nagalase, which is not in any vaccine. The claim was repeated on websites such as GlobalResearch.ca and Natural News. [33]
In October 2018, Disclose.tv published a story claiming that a Zimbabwean man had created an electric car that did not require charging. PolitiFact rated the claim "Pants on Fire", noting that the man's claims had already been reported on in 2015, and that the Zimbabwean technology news website TechZim had noted that the car was outside of the Law of Conservation of Energy. [9]
Disclose.tv promotes anti-vaccine and anti-lockdown narratives, and misrepresents developments related to COVID-19. [2] [6] A study published in March 2021 in the Online Social Networks and Media journal identified Disclose.tv as a purveyor of disinformation during the COVID-19 pandemic. [3]
In March 2021, Disclose.tv misrepresented a report on vaccine passports published by The Washington Post [34] to falsely claim that the Biden administration would both mandate the use of a passport and maintain the system that runs it. [20]
In July 2021, Disclose.tv tweeted that 60% of people being admitted to hospitals in the United Kingdom had received two doses of the COVID-19 vaccine. The claim was based on an incorrect statistic given by Patrick Vallance, the Chief Scientific Advisor for the UK; Vallance issued a statement on Twitter with the correct statistic, which was that 60% of people being hospitalized were unvaccinated. [35] [21] Disclose.tv subsequently deleted its tweet. [21]
In October 2021, Disclose.tv published an article titled "German court declares Corona curfew unconstitutional", which referred to a March 2020 curfew in Bavaria that was retroactively ruled unconstitutional by the State Court. [2] [6]
In February 2022, Disclose.tv shared on Twitter a Reuters article with the incorrect headline "Japan's Kowa says that ivermectin effective against Omicron in phase III trial". [36] [5] The tweet was reshared by podcaster Joe Rogan. [36] [37] Reuters subsequently corrected its headline and article to note that the research conducted by Kowa was non-clinical research; [36] [5] the correction was shared by Disclose.tv, which still falsely stated that ivermectin was "effective against Omicron in phase III trial". [5]
In March 2024, Disclose.tv republished an op-ed by Paul Marik and Pierre Kory in The Hill claiming that long COVID was caused by COVID-19 vaccination instead of COVID-19 infection. The fact-checking website Health Feedback found that the op-ed relied on anecdotes that did not provide evidence to support the claim. [32]
Disclose.tv is owned by Futurebytes GmbH & Co. KG, which describes itself as a "private equity company" and is based in Passau. [2] Futurebytes is registered with the District Court of Passau and its described purpose is e-commerce, marketing and advertising. [38] Futurebytes is owned by Uwe Braun, a Cologne-based entrepreneur who has made money in Internet hosting businesses, [2] with his company Host Europe being sold to GoDaddy for €1.69 billion ($1.82 billion) in 2016. [39] [2] Braun has not publicly acknowledged his connection to Disclose.tv. [6] In the website's imprint, Braun is named as the legally responsible person. [40]
In January 2022, Logically reported that all of the website's articles were attributed to only four writers, none of whom had links to personal websites, social media or bios, and their profile pictures were fakes generated by artificial intelligence. The writers' articles also appeared to have been written by a native German speaker. [2] [6]
The Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), formerly Brixton Endeavors, is a British-American not-for-profit NGO company with offices in London and Washington, D.C. with the stated purpose of stopping the spread of online hate speech and disinformation. It campaigns to deplatform people that it believes promote hate or misinformation, and campaigns to restrict media organisations such as The Daily Wire from advertising. CCDH is a member of the Stop Hate For Profit coalition.
The People's Voice is an American fake news website based in Los Angeles. The site was founded as Your News Wire in 2014 by Sean Adl-Tabatabai and his husband, Sinclair Treadway. In November 2018, it rebranded itself as NewsPunch. Your News Wire was revived as a separate website in November 2020, and has continued publishing hoaxes similar to those in NewsPunch. In 2023, NewsPunch adopted its current name, The People's Voice.
Children's Health Defense (CHD) is an American 501(c)(3) nonprofit activist group mainly known for anti-vaccine disinformation, and which has been called one of the main sources of misinformation on vaccines. Founded under the name World Mercury Project in 2007, it is chaired by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. The group has been campaigning against various public health programs, such as vaccination and fluoridation of drinking water. The group has been contributing to vaccine hesitancy in the United States, encouraging citizens and legislators to support anti-vaccine regulations and legislation. Arguments against vaccination are contradicted by overwhelming scientific consensus about the safety and effectiveness of vaccines. Its $15-million budget is funded through donations from individuals and affiliate marketing revenues.
False information, including intentional disinformation and conspiracy theories, about the scale of the COVID-19 pandemic and the origin, prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of the disease has been spread through social media, text messaging, and mass media. False information has been propagated by celebrities, politicians, and other prominent public figures. Many countries have passed laws against "fake news", and thousands of people have been arrested for spreading COVID-19 misinformation. The spread of COVID-19 misinformation by governments has also been significant.
Plandemic is a trilogy of conspiracy theory films produced by Mikki Willis, promoting misinformation about the COVID-19 pandemic. They feature Judy Mikovits, a discredited American researcher and prominent anti-vaccine activist. The first video, Plandemic: The Hidden Agenda Behind Covid-19, was released on May 4, 2020, under Willis' production company Elevate Films. The second film, Plandemic Indoctornation, which includes more interviewees, was released on August 18 by Brian Rose's distributor of conspiracy theory related films, London Real. Later on June 3, 2023, Plandemic 3: The Great Awakening was released on The Highwire, a website devoted to conspiracy theories run by anti-vaccine activist Del Bigtree.
America's Frontline Doctors (AFLDS) is an American right-wing political organization. Affiliated with Tea Party Patriots co-founder Jenny Beth Martin and publicly led by Simone Gold, the group is opposed to measures intended to control the COVID-19 pandemic, such as business closures, stay-at-home orders, and vaccination. The group promotes falsehoods about the COVID-19 pandemic and COVID-19 vaccines.
Pierre Kory is an American critical care physician who gained attention during the COVID-19 pandemic for advocating widespread off-label use of certain drugs as treatments for COVID-19, as president and co-founder of the Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance (FLCCC). Kory testified twice to the U.S. Senate regarding COVID-19. During his testimony in December 2020, Kory erroneously claimed that the antiparasitic medication ivermectin was a "wonder drug" with "miraculous effectiveness" against COVID-19.
In many countries, the dissemination of varied claims and perspectives regarding COVID-19 vaccines has sparked widespread public discussion. These include concerns about potential side effects, differing interpretations of how the immune system responds to vaccination, and debates over the development and distribution of COVID-19 vaccines. Additionally, stories such as COVID-19 being linked to 5G technology and other debated information have also emerged. This spread of information, including content from anti-vaccination advocates, may have influenced people's attitudes towards vaccination. In response, governments and private organizations around the world have introduced measures to encourage or mandate vaccination, such as lotteries, mandates, and free entry to events. These measures have further fueled debates about their legality and effectiveness.
The White Rose is a group that runs a stickering campaign to distribute disinformation and conspiracy theories about the COVID-19 pandemic. Its name is an appropriation of that of the anti-Nazi White Rose group, to which it is unrelated. Stickers distributed by the group include anti-vaccine and anti-mask messages, denials that the COVID-19 pandemic exists, and conspiracy theories about a New World Order. Their tactics have been compared to those of the anti-immigration Hundred-Handers group.
Logically is a British multinational technology startup company that specializes in analyzing and fighting disinformation. Logically was founded in 2017 by Lyric Jain and is based in Brighouse, England, with offices in London, Mysore, Bangalore, and Virginia.
This timeline includes entries on the spread of COVID-19 misinformation and conspiracy theories related to the COVID-19 pandemic in Canada. This includes investigations into the origin of COVID-19, and the prevention and treatment of COVID-19 which is caused by the virus SARS-CoV-2. Social media apps and platforms, including Facebook, TikTok, Telegram, and YouTube, have contributed to the spread of misinformation. The Canadian Anti-Hate Network (CAHN) reported that conspiracy theories related to COVID-19 began on "day one". CAHN reported on March 16, 2020, that far-right groups in Canada were taking advantage of the climate of anxiety and fear surrounding COVID, to recycle variations of conspiracies from the 1990s, that people had shared over shortwave radio. COVID-19 disinformation is intentional and seeks to create uncertainty and confusion. But most of the misinformation is shared online unintentionally by enthusiastic participants who are politically active.
The Light is a self-published, monthly British far-right and conspiracy theory newspaper founded by Darren Scott Nesbitt on 27 September 2020, which claims the COVID-19 pandemic was a hoax. The paper has a sister publication, named The Irish Light, which was launched in Ireland by Gemma O'Doherty and John Waters. A free Australian paper, The Light Australia, started around June 2023 and is linked to The Light.
The Health Advisory and Recovery Team is a British pressure group opposed to COVID-19 mitigation measures and COVID-19 vaccines.
The Exposé is a British conspiracist and fake news website created in 2020 by Jonathan Allen-Walker. It is known for publishing COVID-19 and anti-vaccine misinformation.
Died Suddenly is a 2022 American anti-vaccination film directed by Matthew Skow and executive-produced by Stew Peters, a far-right and alt-right anti-vaccine activist. It promotes false claims about COVID-19 vaccines and Great Reset conspiracy theories. The film was released on Rumble and Twitter on November 21, 2022.
OpenVAERS is an American anti-vaccine website created in 2021 by Liz Willner. The website misrepresents data from the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) to promote misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines.
Europa: The Last Battle is a 2017 English-language Swedish ten-part neo-Nazi propaganda film directed, written and produced by Tobias Bratt, a Swedish far-right activist associated with the Nordic Resistance Movement, a European neo-Nazi movement. It promotes antisemitic conspiracy theories, including Holocaust denial, and has been promoted across multiple social media platforms.
Real Raw News is an American fake news website created in April 2020. Many of its published stories include misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines, fictional arrests and supposed executions of public figures.
Disclose.tv, a disinformation outlet based in Germany, is bringing fake news to a timeline near you... On the Discord and Telegram group message for Disclose.tv, anti-vax conspiracies, antisemitism, racism, and transphobia are easy to find. On these platforms, messages run the gamut from moderate political beliefs and chatting about aliens to outright Holocaust denial and Nazism.
The most retweeted (2015 retweets as of 26 March 2021) tweet from the second period was one by Disclose.tv, a site described as involved in disinformation.
...the news agency's incorrect article and headline were shared a number of times on Twitter, including by podcaster Joe Rogan (who has since deleted his tweet), Germany-based disinformation outlet Disclose.tv...
Disclose.TV uses grains of truth and English content to mask the way it operates, delivering far-right and conspiracy content to its millions of followers.
A similar clip was posted by Disclose.tv, the Germany-based disinformation firehose...
The initial blog post was published in April 2018 on the conspiracy-fueled website Disclose.tv.
Disclose.TV is a website notoriously known for publishing conspiracy theories and fake news, with a particular interest in publishing UFO-related stories.
And a post on the Telegram channel of conspiracy theory account Disclose TV...
The post above was published on Twitter on Dec. 30, 2021, by the conspiratorial network Disclose TV.
Disclose.tv and Get Off the BS are sites known for publishing outlandish fabrications and fake news in order to attract readers.
Similarly, in the group for Disclose.tv, a sketchy news aggregator site that began as a paranormal and conspiracy theory forum, users shared links to other channels filled with neo-Nazi propaganda.