Disinformation on social media is eroding the US-China trade truce. Chinese state media push baseless reports that Americans are panic-buying Chinese products.From baseless reports of Americans panic-buying Chinese products to bot-generated attacks on US brands, an explosion of disinformation is putting a shadow over an interim trade truce between Washington and Beijing.
The world’s two largest economies settled earlier this month to suspend reciprocal tariffs for 90 days, a surprise easing of their acrimonious trade war after high-level talks in Geneva. But another reality is being written out on social media platforms, such as China’s Douyin and Weibo, where an explosion of misinformation is driving anti-American sentiment that could spoil the delicate peace.
One of the videos, which received millions of views on those platforms and TikTok, purportedly depicts frantic American consumers rushing to buy television sets featuring Chinese brands after trade tension.
However, actually it was an old footage of 2018 depicting shopping madness at a US supermarket on Black Friday. The lie was also exaggerated by Chinese state news media, such as China Daily, with such headlines as: “Americans are beginning to stock up like mad in the face of tariffs and snapping up Chinese-brand TVs.”
One of its online news clips – more reused 2018 footage – contains a “file footage” watermark in the top left corner, seemingly to protect the news outlet from liability.
