Meta abandons fact-checking and relaxes content moderation rules

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has announced a sweeping overhaul of its content moderation policies to reduce censorship and restore “free speech” on Facebook and Instagram.

Meta is ending its third-party fact-checking program, moving to a Community Notes model used by sites like X.com. Meta had filters that checked for any violations of the platform’s policies, but they will now focus on “illegal and serious violations” like drugs, terrorism, and child exploitation. For less serious violations, Meta will rely on users to report issues.

"The problem is that filters get it wrong, and they remove a lot of content that they shouldnʼt... Weʼre also going to adjust our content filters to require much more certainty before removing it. The reality is that itʼs a trade-off," Zuckerberg stressed.

Meta will also get rid of many restrictions on topics like immigration and gender, as what "started as a movement for greater inclusivity has increasingly been used to limit opinions and restrict people with different ideas, and itʼs gone too far."

Instead, political content will return to Facebook and Instagram. Users will be encouraged to take a “personalized” approach to such content.

According to Zuckerberg, Meta will work with President-elect Donald Trump “to confront governments around the world that are persecuting American companies and increasing censorship.” The CEO added that the US has the strongest constitutional protections for free speech in the world, while Europe “has a growing number of laws that institutionalize censorship and make it difficult to create something innovative there,” Latin America “has secret courts that can order companies to quietly close down,” and China has banned Meta.

The only way to reverse this global trend is with the support of the US government. And that’s why it’s been so difficult over the past four years, when even the US government has pushed for censorship. By going after us and other US companies, it has inspired other governments to go even further. But now we have an opportunity to restore freedom of expression, and I’m excited to take it,” Zuckerberg concluded.

The changes will first be implemented in the United States.

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