Meta announces ending fact-checking programme in US

WASHINGTON: Social media giant Meta announced on Tuesday a significant rollback of its content moderation policies, including the termination of its third-party fact-checking programme in the United States.

“We´re going to get rid of fact-checkers and replace them with community notes similar to X, starting in the US,” Meta Founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a post on social media.

Zuckerberg said that “fact checkers have just been too politically biased and have destroyed more trust than they´ve created, especially in the US.”

Meta´s announcement repeated many of the complaints made by Republicans and X-owner Elon Musk about fact-checking programs that many conservatives see as censorship.

The 40-year-old tycoon said that “recent elections feel like a cultural tipping point towards, once again, prioritizing speech.”

The shift came as Zuckerberg has been making efforts to reconcile with US President-elect Donald Trump, including donating one million dollars to his inauguration fund.

Zuckerberg also said Meta sites, including Facebook and Instagram, would “simplify” their content policies “and get rid of a bunch of restrictions on topics like immigration and gender that are just out of touch with mainstream discourse.”

Trump has been a harsh critic of Meta and Zuckerberg in recent years, accusing the company of supporting liberal policies and being biased against conservatives.