What’s next after Meta scraps third party fact-checking?

Meta, the company behind social media giant Facebook and Instagram, earlier announced that it will scrap its current fact-checking model in the United States due to “too many mistakes and too much censorship.” 

“So we built a lot of complex systems to moderate content, but the problem with complex systems is they make mistakes even if they accidentally censor just 1% of posts,” said Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg in a video statement.

“So, we're going to get back to our roots and focus on reducing mistakes, simplifying our policies, and restoring free expression on our platforms,” he added.

The latest move also means dropping Meta’s fact-checkers in the US whom Zuckerberg said “have just been too politically biased and have destroyed more trust than they've created, especially in the US.”

While Meta will transition to a community notes system, similar to X (formerly Twitter), in the US, the current fact-checking model will still be implemented in other countries including the Philippines.

Meta partners with various media organizations in each country to serve as independent fact-checkers. In the Philippines, Meta has partnered with Agence France Presse, Rappler, and Vera Files.

Although Meta has a technology to detect posts that are likely to be misinformation, the fact-checkers also identify a content to review on their own.

The fact-checkers will review a content and rate its accuracy using six assessments:

• False
• Altered
• Partly False
• Missing Context
• Satire
• True

“When content has been rated by fact-checkers, we add a notice to it so people can read additional context. Content rated Satire or True won’t be labeled but a fact-check article will be appended to the post on Facebook,” Meta said.

Further, contents that were rated by the fact-checkers as False, Altered, or Party False may receive reduced distribution on Facebook, Instagram, and Threads.

Meanwhile, pages, groups, profiles, or accounts that repeatedly share contents rated as False or Altered will be placed under some restrictions for a certain period of time.

Similar to X, the community notes model will allow users “to decide when posts are potentially misleading and need more context.”

Meta said it won’t write community notes or decide which ones show up. They will be written and rated by contributing users.

But the tech giant said it will require an agreement between people with “a range of perspectives” to help prevent biased ratings.

Meta has already opened up sign up forms to those who are interested to be among the first contributors to the new model.

For his part, data scientist and technologist Dominic Ligot said that transitioning to a community note model does not necessarily disregard fact-checkers.

“Pwede mo ring (you can) double check yung community notes that others have written. There is a voting process. So if it will follow the X model, the fact checkers can use the community notes also,” he told GMA News Online.

“So by expanding it to kind of a community note system, you did not eliminate naman the fact checkers, they can certainly go through the community note structure, but other people can come in also and chime in.”

But for the Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility (CMFR), disregarding fact-checking means journalists are no longer important as well.

“What is the effect in the Philippines? Our role in the news media is to begin to check the disruptive effect of social media, of these platforms including Facebook or X, on a process that has been established among journalists to try and look for facts, for the truth to emerge from these facts, so that we can interpret the facts. If you say, ‘Well, facts are no longer important’, well we might say that we are no longer important as well,” countered Melinda De Jesus, CMFR executive director.

“It’s the battle for truth and the battle for journalism is going to be much more difficult for us,” she pointed out.
—RF, GMA Integrated News