Teachers across the Netherlands say they are increasingly confronting Holocaust-related disinformation circulating among students, much of it believed to originate from social media platforms and artificial intelligence tools.
A survey conducted by NOS Stories, a division of the Dutch public broadcaster NOS, gathered responses from more than 190 secondary school teachers. Many reported a growing struggle to correct false or misleading narratives about World War II and the Holocaust that students bring into classrooms.
History teacher Maarten Post said students are often exposed to inaccurate content online, particularly through platforms such as TikTok, and then repeat it in discussions at school. He described a recurring problem where pupils are unable to distinguish between credible historical information and fabricated claims.
“The students no longer know what is real and what is fake because of AI and TikTok,” Post told NOS Stories. He added that he prefers students to ask questions directly rather than rely on what they see online, saying this allows for correction and discussion based on verified historical facts.
In one instance, Post said students showed him a TikTok video claiming that Nazi Germany killed 271,000 Jews during World War II — a figure that significantly understates the scale of the Holocaust. According to estimates from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, approximately six million Jews were murdered across Europe, representing around two-thirds of the pre-war Jewish population.
The survey found that one-third of teachers rated their students’ knowledge of the Holocaust as “substandard,” while four in ten said pupils often downplay the scale or severity of the genocide.
Educators warn that the issue is not confined to the Netherlands. Similar concerns have been raised across Europe about the spread of misinformation and manipulated historical content online.
Earlier this year, German Holocaust remembrance institutions issued an open letter urging social media companies to take stronger action against false or distorted depictions of the Holocaust. They warned that digital platforms are increasingly being used to circulate manipulated images and misleading narratives.
The Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum has also highlighted the misuse of artificial intelligence in generating fabricated images of Holocaust victims, calling it a “profound act of disrespect” toward survivors and historical memory.
In a separate incident last year, Elon Musk’s AI platform Grok was criticised after producing misleading statements about the Holocaust following a system update, prompting an investigation by French authorities.
Teachers say the growing volume of online misinformation is making it more difficult to maintain accurate historical understanding in classrooms, especially among younger students who rely heavily on social media as a source of information.
