Natural News (formerly NewsTarget, which is now a separate sister site) is a far-right,

anti-vaccination Vaccine hesitancy is a delay in acceptance, or refusal, of vaccines despite the availability of vaccine services and supporting evidence. The term covers refusals to vaccinate, delaying vaccines, accepting vaccines but remaining uncertain abou ...

conspiracy theory and

fake news website Fake news websites (also referred to as hoax news websites) are websites on the Internet that deliberately publish fake news— hoaxes, propaganda, and disinformation purporting to be real news—often using social media to drive web traffic and ...

known for promoting alternative medicine,

pseudoscience Pseudoscience consists of statements, beliefs, or practices that claim to be both scientific and factual but are incompatible with the scientific method. Pseudoscience is often characterized by contradictory, exaggerated or unfalsifiable clai ...

disinformation Disinformation is false information deliberately spread to deceive people. It is sometimes confused with misinformation, which is false information but is not deliberate. The English word ''disinformation'' comes from the application of the L ...

, and far-right extremism. The website began publishing articles in 2008 and is based in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

. The site's founder, Michael Allen "Mike" Adams, gained attention after posting a blog entry implying a call for violence against proponents of GMO foods, and then allegedly creating another website with a list of names of alleged supporters. He has been accused of using "pseudoscience to sell his lies". Adams has described vaccines as "medical child abuse". The website sells various dietary supplements, promotes alternative medicine and climate change denial, makes tendentious nutrition and health claims, disseminates

fake news Fake news is false or misleading information presented as news. Fake news often has the aim of damaging the reputation of a person or entity, or making money through advertising revenue.Schlesinger, Robert (April 14, 2017)"Fake news in reality ...

, and espouses various

conspiracy theories A conspiracy theory is an explanation for an event or situation that invokes a conspiracy by sinister and powerful groups, often political in motivation, when other explanations are more probable.Additional sources: * * * * The term has a nega ...

and pro-Donald Trump propaganda. These conspiracy theories include chemophobic claims about the purported dangers of " chemtrails", fluoridated drinking water, heavy metals, anti-perspirants,

laundry detergent Laundry detergent is a type of detergent (cleaning agent) used for cleaning dirty laundry (clothes). Laundry detergent is manufactured in powder (washing powder) and liquid form. While powdered and liquid detergents hold roughly equal share o ...

monosodium glutamate Monosodium glutamate (MSG), also known as sodium glutamate, is the sodium salt of glutamic acid. MSG is found naturally in some foods including tomatoes and cheese in this glutamic acid form. MSG is used in cooking as a flavor enhancer wi ...

, aspartame, and

vaccines A vaccine is a biological preparation that provides active acquired immunity to a particular infectious or malignant disease. The safety and effectiveness of vaccines has been widely studied and verified.< ...

. It has also spread conspiracy theories about the

Zika virus ''Zika virus'' (ZIKV; pronounced or ) is a member of the virus family ''Flaviviridae''. It is spread by daytime-active '' Aedes'' mosquitoes, such as '' A. aegypti'' and '' A. albopictus''. Its name comes from the Ziika Forest of Uganda, w ...

allegedly being spread by genetically modified

mosquito Mosquitoes (or mosquitos) are members of a group of almost 3,600 species of small flies within the family Culicidae (from the Latin ''culex'' meaning " gnat"). The word "mosquito" (formed by ''mosca'' and diminutive ''-ito'') is Spanish for "li ...

es and purported adverse effects of genetically modified crops, as well as the farming practices associated with and foods derived from them. As of 2014, Natural News had approximately 7 million unique visitors per month. In May 2020,

Facebook Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin Mosk ...

banned Natural News content from its platform after discovering that the site was boosting its popularity using content farms in

North Macedonia North Macedonia, ; sq, Maqedonia e Veriut, (Macedonia before February 2019), officially the Republic of North Macedonia,, is a country in Southeast Europe. It gained independence in 1991 as one of the successor states of Yugoslavia. It ...

and the

Philippines The Philippines (; fil, Pilipinas, links=no), officially the Republic of the Philippines ( fil, Republika ng Pilipinas, links=no), * bik, Republika kan Filipinas * ceb, Republika sa Pilipinas * cbk, República de Filipinas * hil, Republ ...

, a form of

spamming Spamming is the use of messaging systems to send multiple unsolicited messages (spam) to large numbers of recipients for the purpose of commercial advertising, for the purpose of non-commercial proselytizing, for any prohibited purpose (especia ...

. Natural News bypassed the ban by republishing its content on a large number of topic-specific

domain names A domain name is a string that identifies a realm of administrative autonomy, authority or control within the Internet. Domain names are often used to identify services provided through the Internet, such as websites, email services and more. As ...

, including trump.news, extinction.news, mind.control.news, and veggie.news. The Institute for Strategic Dialogue found 496 domain names associated with Natural News as of June 2020.

Founder

Michael Allen "Mike" Adams (born 1967 in Lawrence, Kansas) is the founder and owner of Natural News; the domain name was registered in 2005 and began publishing articles in 2008. According to Adams' own website, he became interested in alternative nutrition when he developed

type II diabetes Type 2 diabetes, formerly known as adult-onset diabetes, is a form of diabetes mellitus that is characterized by high blood sugar, insulin resistance, and relative lack of insulin. Common symptoms include increased thirst, frequent urinatio ...

at the age of 30 and one of his websites asserts "he cured himself of diabetes in a matter of months and transformed himself into the picture of perfect health in mind, body and spirit" himself using natural remedies. However, ''

The Daily Beast ''The Daily Beast'' is an American news website focused on politics, media, and pop culture. It was founded in 2008. It has been characterized as a "high-end tabloid" by Noah Shachtman, the site's editor-in-chief from 2018 to 2021. In a 20 ...

'' found that his recommendation for Amazon Herb Company products in at least eight articles, including a supposed "third-party review...from a truly independent perspective" turn out to be misleading; he has a financial interest in the company, according to non-profit business records in Arizona. He is a raw foods enthusiast and holistic

nutritionist A nutritionist is a person who advises others on matters of food and nutrition and their impacts on health. Some people specialize in particular areas, such as sports nutrition, public health, or animal nutrition, among other disciplines. In many ...

. He claims to eat no processed foods, dairy, sugar, meat from mammals or food products containing additives such as

(MSG). He also says he avoids use of prescription drugs and visits to Western medical doctors. Adams has endorsed conspiracy theories surrounding the

Deepwater Horizon oil spill The ''Deepwater Horizon'' oil spill (also referred to as the "BP oil spill") was an industrial disaster that began on 20 April 2010 off of the coast of the United States in the Gulf of Mexico on the BP-operated Macondo Prospect, considere ...

, and those involving

Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 (MH370/MAS370) was an international passenger flight operated by Malaysia Airlines that disappeared on 8 March 2014 while flying from Kuala Lumpur International Airport in Malaysia to its planned destination ...

. He has endorsed ''Burzynski: Cancer Is Serious Business'', a movie about Stanislaw Burzynski.

Steven Novella Steven Paul Novella (born July 29, 1964) is an American clinical neurologist and associate professor at Yale University School of Medicine. Novella is best known for his involvement in the skeptical movement as a host of '' The Skeptics' Guide ...

characterizes Adams as "a dangerous conspiracy-mongering crank". Adams has also endorsed the books of conspiracy theorist

Jim Marrs James Farrell Marrs Jr. (December 5, 1943 – August 2, 2017) was an American newspaper journalist and ''New York Times'' best-selling author of books and articles on a wide range of alleged cover-ups and conspiracies. Marrs was a prominent ...

. Adams has made music videos expressing similar viewpoints as the articles posted on his website, such as opposition to the

swine flu vaccine The 2009 swine flu pandemic vaccines were influenza vaccines developed to protect against the pandemic H1N1/09 virus. These vaccines either contained inactivated (killed) influenza virus, or weakened live virus that could not cause influenza. The ...

. In 2012, after the

Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting The Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting occurred on December 14, 2012, in Newtown, Connecticut, United States, when 20-year-old Adam Lanza shot and killed 26 people. Twenty of the victims were children between six and seven years old, and t ...

occurred, Adams called for "medication control" instead of gun control. In March 2018, Adams created Hoggwatch.com, a website

Snopes ''Snopes'' , formerly known as the ''Urban Legends Reference Pages'', is a fact-checking website. It has been described as a "well-regarded reference for sorting out myths and rumors" on the Internet. The site has also been seen as a source f ...

said was "apparently created solely for the purpose of attacking Parkland shooting survivor

David Hogg David Miles Hogg (born April 12, 2000) is an American gun control activist. He rose to prominence during the 2018 United States gun violence protests as a student survivor of the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting, helping lead several hi ...

Criticism and controversies

Writing in the journal ''

Vaccine A vaccine is a biological preparation that provides active acquired immunity to a particular infectious or malignant disease. The safety and effectiveness of vaccines has been widely studied and verified.

'', Anna Kata identified Natural News as one of numerous websites spreading "irresponsible health information". According to John Banks, Adams uses "pseudoscience to sell his lies" and is "seen as generally a quack and a shill by science bloggers." One such blogger,

David Gorski David Henry Gorski is an American Surgical oncology, surgical oncologist, professor of surgery at Wayne State University School of Medicine, and a surgical oncologist at the Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute, specializing in Breast cancer#Sur ...

ScienceBlogs ScienceBlogs is an invitation-only blog network and virtual community that operated initially for almost 12 years, from 2006 to 2017. It was created by Seed Media Group to enhance public understanding of science. Each blog had its own theme, spec ...

, called Natural News "one of the most wretched hives of scum and quackery on the Internet," and the most "blatant purveyor of the worst kind of

quackery Quackery, often synonymous with health fraud, is the promotion of fraudulent or ignorant medical practices. A quack is a "fraudulent or ignorant pretender to medical skill" or "a person who pretends, professionally or publicly, to have skill, ...

and paranoid anti-physician and anti-medicine conspiracy theories anywhere on the Internet", and a one-stop-shop for "virtually every quackery known to humankind, all slathered with a heaping, helping of unrelenting hostility to science-based medicine and science in general." Peter Bowditch of the website Ratbags commented about the site.

of NeuroLogica Blog called NaturalNews "a crank alt med site that promotes every sort of medical nonsense imaginable." Novella continued: "If it is unscientific, antiscientific, conspiracy-mongering, or downright silly, Mike Adams appears to be all for it—whatever sells the "natural" products he hawks on his site." Individuals who commented about Adams' website include astronomer and blogger

Phil Plait Philip Cary Plait (born September 30, 1964), also known as The Bad Astronomer, is an American astronomer, skeptic, and popular science blogger. Plait has worked as part of the Hubble Space Telescope team, images and spectra of astronomical objec ...

PZ Myers Paul Zachary Myers (born March 9, 1957) is an American biologist who founded and writes the ''Pharyngula'' science-blog. He is associate professor of biology at the University of Minnesota Morris (UMM)

, and Mark Hoofnagle. In 2011 and 2015 Brian Dunning listed NaturalNews.com as #1 on his "Top 10 Worst Anti-Science Websites" lists. Adams is listed as a "promoter of questionable methods" by

Quackwatch Quackwatch is a United States-based website, self-described as a "network of people" founded by Stephen Barrett, which aims to "combat health-related frauds, myths, fads, fallacies, and misconduct" and to focus on "quackery-related information th ...

. Robert T. Carroll at

The Skeptic's Dictionary ''The Skeptic's Dictionary'' is a collection of cross-referenced skeptical essays by Robert Todd Carroll, published on his website skepdic.com and in a printed book. The skepdic.com site was launched in 1994 and the book was published in 2003 wi ...

said, "Natural News is not a very good source for information. If you don't trust me on this, go to Respectful Insolence or any of the other bloggers on ScienceBlogs and do a search for "Natural News" or "Mike Adams" (who is Natural News). Hundreds of entries will be found and not one of them will have a good word to say about Mike Adams as a source." According to ''

The Atlantic ''The Atlantic'' is an American magazine and multi-platform publisher. It features articles in the fields of politics, foreign affairs, business and the economy, culture and the arts, technology, and science. It was founded in 1857 in Boston, ...

'', Natural News is one of the most prominent anti-vaccination websites on Facebook. An article in the journal ''Vaccine'' said the site "tend(s) to not only spread irresponsible health information in general (e.g. discouraging

chemotherapy Chemotherapy (often abbreviated to chemo and sometimes CTX or CTx) is a type of cancer treatment that uses one or more anti-cancer drugs ( chemotherapeutic agents or alkylating agents) as part of a standardized chemotherapy regimen. Chemothe ...

or radiation for

cancer Cancer is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Possible signs and symptoms include a lump, abnormal b ...

treatment, antiretrovirals for

HIV The human immunodeficiency viruses (HIV) are two species of ''Lentivirus'' (a subgroup of retrovirus) that infect humans. Over time, they cause acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), a condition in which progressive failure of the immune ...

, and insulin for diabetes), but also have large sections with dubious information on vaccines." After

Patrick Swayze Patrick Wayne Swayze (; August 18, 1952 – September 14, 2009) was an American actor, dancer, and singer known for playing distinctive lead roles, particularly romantic, tough, and comedic characters. He was also known for his media image and ...

died in 2009, Adams posted an article in which he remarked that Swayze, in dying, "joins many other celebrities who have been recently killed by pharmaceuticals or chemotherapy." Commentators of Adams' article on Patrick Swayze included bloggers such as David Gorski and Phil Plait, the latter of whom called Adams' commentary "obnoxious and loathsome." When

Angelina Jolie Angelina Jolie (; born Angelina Jolie Voight; June 4, 1975) is an American actress, filmmaker, humanitarian and former Special Envoy to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees. The recipient of numerous accolades, including an Academy Award ...

underwent a double mastectomy in May 2013 because she had a mutation in the

BRCA1 Breast cancer type 1 susceptibility protein is a protein that in humans is encoded by the ''BRCA1'' () gene. Orthologs are common in other vertebrate species, whereas invertebrate genomes may encode a more distantly related gene. ''BRCA1'' is a ...

gene, Adams stated that "Countless millions of women carry the BRCA1 gene and never express breast cancer because they lead healthy, anti-cancer lifestyles based on smart nutrition, exercise, sensible sunlight exposure and avoidance of cancer-causing chemicals." Gorski called the article "vile" and noted that Adams had written similarly themed articles about the death of

Michael Jackson Michael Joseph Jackson (August 29, 1958 – June 25, 2009) was an American singer, songwriter, dancer, and philanthropist. Dubbed the "King of Pop", he is regarded as one of the most significant cultural figures of the 20th century. Over a ...

Tony Snow Robert Anthony Snow (June 1, 1955 – July 12, 2008) was an American journalist, political commentator, anchor, columnist, musician, and the 25th White House Press Secretary under President George W. Bush, from May 2006 until his resignatio ...

, and

Tim Russert Timothy John Russert (May 7, 1950 – June 13, 2008) was an American television journalist and lawyer who appeared for more than 16 years as the longest-serving moderator of NBC's ''Meet the Press''. He was a senior vice president at NBC News, Wa ...

. In February 2014, Brian Palmer, writing in the '' Daily Herald'' of Arlington Heights, Illinois, criticized the site's promotion of alternative medicine treatments, such as bathing in

Himalayan salt Himalayan salt is rock salt (halite) mined from the Punjab region of Pakistan. The salt, which often has a pinkish tint due to trace minerals, is primarily used as a food additive to replace refined table salt but is also used for cooking and fo ...

and eating

Hijiki (''Sargassum fusiforme'', syn. ''Hizikia fusiformis''), sometimes called hiziki, is a brown sea vegetable growing wild on rocky coastlines of East Asia. Hijiki has been a part of the Japanese culinary sphere and diet for centuries. It is ric ...

seaweed, and referred to the claims Natural News made about their efficacy as "preposterous." In August 2014, Nathanael Johnson, writing for

Grist Grist is grain that has been separated from its chaff in preparation for grinding. It can also mean grain that has been ground at a gristmill. Its etymology derives from the verb ''grind.'' Grist can be ground into meal or flour, depending on ho ...

, dismissed Natural News as "simply not credible" and as "nothing but a conspiracy-theory site." On August 11, 2014, ''Natural News'' published a blog post promoting a

homeopathic Homeopathy or homoeopathy is a pseudoscientific system of alternative medicine. It was conceived in 1796 by the German physician Samuel Hahnemann. Its practitioners, called homeopaths, believe that a substance that causes symptoms of a dise ...

treatment for Ebola, which was met with harsh criticism from several commentators, and was taken down later that day. In a statement on the article, NaturalNews said that the blogger who posted the article, Ken Oftedal, was "under review" and that they did not condone anyone interacting with Ebola. However, as of August 20, 2014, the site was still featuring an article written by Adams promoting the use of herbal medicines to treat Ebola. In an article about "fake Ebola cures", Adams was criticized for arguing that herbs could prove effective as an Ebola treatment. Natural News was among the pseudoscience platforms which promoted hoaxes about the 2014 Ebola epidemic, including claims that an infected woman was found in Atlanta and that Ebola was a bioweapon. On December 8, 2016, Michael V. LeVine, writing in ''

Business Insider ''Insider'', previously named ''Business Insider'' (''BI''), is an American financial and business news website founded in 2007. Since 2015, a majority stake in ''Business Insider''s parent company Insider Inc. has been owned by the German pub ...

'', criticized the site as part of a scientific

epidemic: "Snake-oil salesmen have pushed false cures since the dawn of medicine, and now websites like ''Natural News'' flood social media with dangerous anti-pharmaceutical, anti-vaccination and anti-GMO pseudoscience that puts millions at risk of contracting preventable illnesses." On February 22, 2017,

Google Google LLC () is an American Multinational corporation, multinational technology company focusing on Search Engine, search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, software, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, ar ...

delisted about 140,000 pages on Natural News, removing it from search results. It was returned soon after. The following year, on March 3, 2018,

YouTube YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second mo ...

removed Natural News' video channel for terms of service violations, effectively removing its library of videos from the site. The channel was subsequently reinstated and the videos returned. In June 2019,

removed Natural News from its website for violating its policies against spam. Adams wrote on ''

InfoWars ''InfoWars'' is an American far-right conspiracy theory and fake news website owned by Alex Jones. It was founded in 1999, and operates under Free Speech Systems LLC. Talk shows and other content for the site are created primarily in stud ...

'' that his site was "permanently banned" from Facebook, and on '' The Gateway Pundit'' that the ban was part of a conspiracy against his website. A 2020 study by researchers from

Northeastern The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west—each se ...

, Harvard, Northwestern and

Rutgers Rutgers University (; RU), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a public land-grant research university consisting of four campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's College, and w ...

universities found that Natural News was among the top 5 most shared fake news domains in tweets related to

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was identified in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. The disease quickly ...

, the others being ''The Gateway Pundit'', ''InfoWars'', ''

WorldNetDaily ''WND'' (formerly ''WorldNetDaily'') is an American far-right fake news website. It is known for promoting falsehoods and conspiracy theories, including the false claim that former President Barack Obama was not born in the United States. Th ...

'' and

Judicial Watch Judicial Watch (JW) is an American conservative activist group that files Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuits to investigate claimed misconduct by government officials. Founded in 1994, JW has primarily targeted Democrats, in particu ...

Notable claims

In 2011, Adams posted a report on Natural News which stated that many blueberry food products did not contain real blueberries. In 2013, Adams posted an article describing what he saw when he examined

Chicken McNugget Chicken McNuggets are a type of chicken nuggets sold by the international fast food restaurant chain McDonald's. They consist of small pieces of reconstituted boneless chicken meat that have been battered and deep fried. Chicken McNuggets we ...

s under a microscope. He said in the article that the patterns he saw included "dark black hair-like structures" and a round algae-like object. In July 2014, Adams compared media outlets that wrote positively about GMOs with Nazi Germany's propagandists, calling them, "Monsanto collaborators who have signed on to accelerate heinous crimes being committed against humanity under the false promise of 'feeding the world' with toxic GMOs." He continued with a statement that he set in

boldface In typography, emphasis is the strengthening of words in a text with a font in a different style from the rest of the text, to highlight them. It is the equivalent of prosody stress in speech. Methods and use The most common methods in W ...

: "that it is the moral right—and even the obligation—of human beings everywhere to actively plan and carry out the killing of those engaged in heinous crimes against humanity." A day after the post a website called "Monsanto Collaborator" appeared online which listed the names of scientists and journalists who allegedly collaborate with the bio industry; Adams denied creating the website claiming that Monsanto set up the website in order to frame him. In 2019, Natural News falsely claimed that

wind turbine A wind turbine is a device that converts the kinetic energy of wind into electrical energy. Hundreds of thousands of large turbines, in installations known as wind farms, now generate over 650 gigawatts of power, with 60 GW added each yea ...

s contribute more to climate change than fossil fuels.

References

External links

* {{Official website, http://www.naturalnews.com/index.html 9/11 conspiracy theorists Alternative medicine publications Conspiracist media HIV/AIDS denialism Pseudoscience Fake news websites Anti-vaccination media Anti-vaccination in the United States Websites with far-right material American conservative websites Climate change denial Internet properties established in 2008 2008 establishments in the United States