Mark Zuckerberg’s decision to get rid of fact-checkers at Facebook and “prioritize free speech” weeks before Donald Trump returns to power was condemned on Tuesday as a “major step backwards” for public discourse.
The Meta founder announced multiple changes to his platforms, including Facebook and Instagram, in an attempt to “dramatically reduce the amount of censorship.”
In a statement on Tuesday, it said that starting in the US, independent fact-checkers would be replaced in the US by a “community notes” system similar to that used on X, Elon’s social media platform. Musk, which relies on users to add warnings. and context of controversial publications.
Content moderation teams would also move from California to Texas “where there is less concern about bias on our teams,” Zuckerberg said in a five-minute video statement to Nina Jankowicz, a former U.S. government official tasked with combating misinformation. , described as “a total bend of the knee to Trump.”
Changes to how Meta filters content would also mean that “we’re going to detect less bad stuff” while still taking seriously “a lot of legitimately bad things that exist, drugs, terrorism, child exploitation,” Zuckerberg said.
He said fact-checkers were “too politically biased” – an accusation steadfastly denied by fact-checking organizations – and said Meta would “remove a bunch of restrictions on issues like immigration and gender that are simply out of touch with the dominant discourse”.
The 40-year-old billionaire said the change came in response to the US presidential election, which he called “a cultural turning point toward, once again, prioritizing speech.”
Trump and Zuckerberg have had a rollercoaster relationship, with Trump threatening to jail the tech chief if he interfered in the election and then a rapprochement in November over a dinner at Mar-a-Lago and Zuckerberg donating $1 million.
Trump said Tuesday that the changes were “probably” in response to his warnings, adding, “I think you’ve come a long way, Meta, Facebook.”
Last week it was announced that former UK Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg would step down as Meta’s president of global affairs to be replaced by prominent Republican Joel Kaplan. Dana White, CEO of Ultimate Fighting Championship and a prominent Trump supporter, was also named to Meta’s board of directors as the tech company prepares for Trump’s second term, which will have major influence over tech companies. through investments, subsidies and regulation, particularly artificial intelligence.
But activists against the harm caused through social media to women, children and ethnic minorities, as well as scientists, reacted to the news with dismay.
Global Witness, a human rights group, said: “Zuckerberg’s announcement is a blatant attempt to reach out to the incoming Trump administration, with damaging implications. “These changes will make it more dangerous for women, LGBT+ people, people of colour, scientists and activists to speak out online, where they already face disproportionate harassment and attacks.”
The Center for Information Resilience, an organization whose activities include monitoring online hate speech and misinformation based on people’s gender, ethnicity and sexuality, warned it was a “huge step backwards.” for content moderation at a time when misinformation and harmful content are evolving faster than ever.” ”.
Ian Russell, the father of 14-year-old Molly Russell, who took her own life after viewing thousands of images promoting suicide and self-harm on social media including Instagram, said the measures “could have dire consequences for many children and young adults.
He said he was “dismayed that the company intends to stop proactive moderation of many forms of harmful content and act only when a user complaint is received.”
Meta said content about suicide, self-harm and eating disorders would continue to be considered “high severity violations” and “will continue to use our automated systems to look for that high severity content.”
UK TV presenter Piers Morgan expressed strong support for Meta’s move when he welcomed it as “a complete U-turn on all the censorship and cancellation of cultural nonsense”.
Co-chairs of Meta’s supervisory board, including former Danish Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt, said in a statement: “We look forward to working with Meta in the coming weeks to understand the changes in greater detail, ensuring their new approach.” . can be as effective and speech-friendly as possible.”
They added: “It is essential that decisions about content are made with maximum input from voices outside of Meta, including the people who use its platforms every day.”
In London, a spokesman for Prime Minister Keir Starmer declined to comment on Zuckerberg’s comments but stressed that the U.K. had its own protections in the new Online Safety Act.
“Our relationship with the United States in several areas is very important,” they said, adding: “Our online security provisions coming in March are among the strongest on offer.”
A spokesperson for the Department of Science, Innovation and Technology said: “We are closely analyzing the impact of Meta’s announcement on its US platform. “The UK Online Safety Act will force them to remove content that is illegal and harmful to children here in the UK, and we continue to urge social media companies to counter the spread of misinformation and disinformation hosted on their platforms.”
Angie Drobnic Holan, director of the International Fact-Checking Network that certified the fact-checkers used by Meta, denied that the fact-checkers had been biased, saying: “That line of attack comes from those who feel they should be able to exaggerate and lie without rebuttal. no contradiction.” .”
Chris Morris, chief executive of British fact-checking organization Full Fact, which has been funded by Meta to fact-check Facebook content, called the announcement “a step backwards that risks having a chilling effect around the world.” ”. He said his organization’s fact-checkers evaluated claims “from all political stripes with equal rigor, holding those in power to account through our commitment to the truth.”
“Excluding fact-checkers from the conversation will not help society turn the tide on rapidly increasing misinformation,” he said.
Zuckerberg said removing some restrictions on content on topics like gender and immigration would “ensure that people can share their beliefs and experiences on our platforms” and said the focus of filters that scan posts for policy violations would move to address only illegal topics and high severity violations.
“By reducing them, we will dramatically reduce the amount of censorship on our platforms,” he said. “We are also adjusting our content filters to require much greater confidence before removing content. The reality is that it is a compensation. It means we’re going to catch less bad stuff, but we’re also going to reduce innocent people’s posts and accounts that we accidentally delete.”
He said Meta would “work with President Trump to push back against governments around the world that are going after American companies and pushing for more censorship.”
He cited Europe as a place with “an increasing number of laws that institutionalize censorship and make it difficult to build anything innovative” and said: “Latin American countries have secret courts that can order companies to quietly remove things.”