live Trump, Xi hold high-stakes talks in South Korea amidst renewed tensions
U.S. President Donald Trump met with China's leader Xi Jinping at a South Korean air base on Thursday for discussions on a possible trade war truce be...
Meta will replace its fact-checking system with community notes, similar to X's, CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced Tuesday. The change, starting in the US, comes after Donald Trump's election victory and marks a major shift in how the social media giant moderates content on its platforms.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced this Tuesday that the company will end its long-running fact-checking programme, replacing it with “community notes similar to X”, marking a significant shift in how the social media giant approaches content moderation.
Starting in the United States, the change comes in the wake of Donald Trump's recent election victory and represents what Zuckerberg called a "cultural tipping point towards, once again, prioritising speech" on Meta's platforms.
The move effectively dismantles a system that has been in place since 2016, which relied on partnerships with over 90 independent fact-checking organisations working across more than 60 languages. In the United States, this has included groups such as PolitiFact and Factcheck.org. Under the new approach, users will be able to add context to potentially misleading posts instead, similar to X's Community Notes feature.
In his video announcement, Zuckerberg criticised the existing fact-checking system, stating that fact-checkers have been "too politically biased and have destroyed more trust than they've created." The change reflects a broader overhaul of Meta's content moderation practices, including the relocation of its trust and safety teams from California to Texas.
The announcement follows several recent shifts at Meta that suggest a changing relationship with the incoming Trump administration. The company recently appointed Republican Joel Kaplan to lead its policy team, replacing former UK deputy prime minister Nick Clegg as president of global affairs. In December, Meta also made a $1 million donation to Trump's inaugural fund.
Beyond fact-checking, Meta plans to simplify its content policies and remove certain restrictions on topics such as immigration and gender. The company will also adjust its content filters to require "higher confidence" before removing posts, though Zuckerberg acknowledged this means they will "catch less bad stuff."
The changes represent a significant departure from Meta's previous approach to content moderation, which had been strengthened in response to concerns about misinformation following the 2016 election. Under the new system, while Meta will continue to moderate content related to illegal activities and what Zuckerberg termed "high severity violations," the company will rely more heavily on user reports for other violations.
Zuckerberg also indicated that Meta would work with the incoming Trump administration to resist what he described as censorship pressures from other governments, particularly criticising European regulations that he said "make it difficult to build anything innovative."
The announcement has sparked debate about the future of content moderation on social media platforms, which collectively reach billions of users worldwide. Meta's platforms alone, including Facebook and Instagram, serve over 3 billion users globally, making this shift in policy potentially one of the most significant changes to online content moderation in recent years.
A small, silent object from another star is cutting through the Solar System. It’s real, not a film, and one scientist thinks it might be sending a message.
At least 69 people have died and almost 150 injured following a powerful 6.9-magnitude earthquake off the coast of Cebu City in the central Visayas region of the Philippines, officials said, making it one of the country’s deadliest disasters this year.
A tsunami threat was issued in Chile after a magnitude 7.8 earthquake struck the Drake Passage on Friday. The epicenter was located 135 miles south of Puerto Williams on the north coast of Navarino Island.
The war in Ukraine has reached a strategic impasse, and it seems that the conflict will not be solved by military means. This creates a path toward one of two alternatives: either a “frozen” phase that can last indefinitely or a quest for a durable political regulation.
A shooting in Nice, southeastern France, left two people dead and five injured on Friday, authorities said.
U.S. President Donald Trump met with China's leader Xi Jinping at a South Korean air base on Thursday for discussions on a possible trade war truce between the world's two largest economies.
Hundreds of civilians were reportedly killed by the Rapid Support Forces at the main hospital in el-Fasher, days after the militia captured the Sudanese city, the head of the UN health agency said.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Wednesday that the most difficult situation on the front line remains the eastern city of Pokrovsk, where fighting continues to be most intense due to a strong concentration of Russian forces.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is conducting inspections in Iran but has not visited the three sites that were bombed by the United States in June, IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi said Wednesday.
Hurricane Melissa tore through the Caribbean on Wednesday, leaving at least 25 dead in Haiti and causing devastation across Jamaica, Cuba, and the Bahamas. The Category 5 storm made history as the strongest hurricane to directly hit Jamaica, with sustained winds of 185 mph (298 kph).
You can download the AnewZ application from Play Store and the App Store.
What is your opinion on this topic?
Leave the first comment