Did YouTube flatten the Earth?

Today marks exactly 50 years since the launch of the Apollo 11 mission to put the first man on the Moon. Ever since that day in 1969 conspiracy theories have sprung up alleging that the whole thing is a hoax, and now there is a growing community of people who don’t even believe the earth is round. In this episode, Marco Silva, a reporter for BBC Trending introduces us to Dave from Sheffield, a man who is convinced that the earth is flat. He is part of a group whose false ideas have spread with the help of the YouTube algorithm. We learn about the people trying to address the misinformation problem and what YouTube is doing about conspiracy theories on its platform.

If you want to know how dangerous medical misinformation can be spread by health bloggers, you can listen to our anti-vax episode here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p072rpnk

Producers: Lucy Hancock and Alicia Burrell Editor: John Shields