Thumbs down to Meta for doing away fact checkers, it is a political move

Many analysts gave a thumbs down to Meta’s decision in doing away with third party fact checkers and instead, relying on Community Notes. They particularly saw the move as a political one, appeasing President elect Donald Trump.

“This is a major step back for content moderation at a time when disinformation and harmful content are evolving faster than ever,” said Ross Burley, co-founder of the nonprofit Centre for Information Resilience.

“While efforts to protect free expression are vital, removing fact-checking without a credible alternative risks opening the floodgates to more harmful narratives,” Burley said.

Community Notes is a crowd-sourced moderation tool that X has promoted as the way for users to add context to posts, but researchers have repeatedly questioned its effectiveness in combating falsehoods.

“You wouldn’t rely on just anyone to stop your toilet from leaking, but Meta now seeks to rely on just anyone to stop misinformation from spreading on their platforms,” Michael Wagner, from the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, told AFP.

“Asking people, pro bono, to police the false claims that get posted on Meta’s multi-billion dollar social media platforms is an abdication of social responsibility.”

The decision will also “hurt social media users who are looking for accurate, reliable information to make decisions about their everyday lives and interactions”, said IFCN director Angie Holan.

“It’s unfortunate that this decision comes in the wake of external political pressure from a new administration and its supporters,” Holan added.

Meta’s announcement was cheered by conservative supporters of Trump, who said the move had “probably” been in response to his threats against the company and Zuckerberg, AFP reported.

Senator Marsha Blackburn (R-Tennessee) posted on X that Meta’s move was “a ploy to avoid being regulated”.

Aaron Sharockman, executive director of US fact-checking organisation PolitiFact said: “The great thing about free speech is that people are able to disagree about any piece of journalism we post,” Sharockman said.

“If Meta is upset it created a tool to censor, it should look in the mirror.”

PolitiFact is one of the early partners who worked with Facebook to launch the fact-checking program in the US in 2016.

“We should be clear that Zuckerberg’s promise of getting rid of fact-checkers was a choice of politics, not policy.” said Alexios Mantzarlis, director of the Security, Trust, and Safety Initiative at Cornell Tech.