Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced significant changes to the company’s moderation policies and practices on Tuesday, reflecting a changing political and social landscape and a commitment to promoting free speech. Zuckerberg stated that Meta will discontinue its fact-checking program with trusted partners and implement a community-driven system akin to X’s Community Notes. The platform will also revise its content moderation policies related to political topics and reverse previous adjustments that reduced political content in user feeds on Facebook, Instagram, and Threads.
In a video message, Zuckerberg emphasized a return to the company’s core values, aiming to minimize errors, simplify policies, and uphold free expression on their platforms. He highlighted plans to eliminate fact checkers and introduce community notes, starting in the U.S. The decision was influenced by recent elections and criticism of governments and traditional media outlets for advocating increased censorship.
Acknowledging flaws in the existing moderation systems, Zuckerberg expressed a commitment to continue monitoring content related to drugs, terrorism, and child exploitation while streamlining policies and focusing on high-severity violations. The company also intends to relocate its trust and safety and content moderation team from California to Texas, along with adjusting content filters to require greater certainty before content removal.
The adjustments occur against a backdrop of Meta and other social media companies reevaluating content moderation practices amidst growing politicization. The decision to end fact-checking and shift focus towards community-driven initiatives aligns with a broader trend in the industry. CEO Elon Musk’s Community Notes system, which emphasizes community input and has garnered praise from conservatives, influenced Meta’s decision-making process.
Zuckerberg’s announcement coincides with increasing engagement between corporate leaders and the incoming administration.
Meta, among other tech companies, contributed $1 million to Trump’s inaugural fund. Leading up to the election, Zuckerberg commended Trump in an interview with Bloomberg Television without explicitly endorsing him. Before Trump’s inauguration, Meta reportedly appointed Republican Joel Kaplan to head its policy team. The company also announced that UFC’s Dana White, a longtime Trump supporter, would join its board. Kaplan appeared on Fox News as part of the company’s announcement rollout, with no other Meta executive making appearances on news channels.
Meta’s initial fact-checking system, launched on Facebook in 2016, involved running information through third-party fact-checkers certified by the International Fact-Checking Network and the European Fact-Checking Standards Network. This program included over 90 organizations fact-checking posts in more than 60 languages, such as PolitiFact and Factcheck.org in the United States. Meta identified potentially misleading posts based on user responses and the speed of content spread. Fact-checkers categorized content as “False,” “Altered,” “Partly False,” “Missing Context,” “Satire,” or “True,” applying notices to flagged posts and lowering their visibility until reviewed.
These fact-checking measures expanded to Instagram in 2019 and Threads the following year. Fact-checkers reviewed various content types, including ads, articles, photos, videos, and text-only posts. Content removal only occurred if it violated Meta’s community standards, determined by the company itself.
In addition to content moderation changes, Zuckerberg announced modifications to Meta’s recommendation system, aiming to reintroduce civic content to address users’ desire for political information. He mentioned that previous limitations on political content were due to user stress, but the company would now gradually reintroduce it while promoting positive engagement.
Zuckerberg also expressed Meta’s commitment to collaborating with the incoming Trump administration to defend free speech globally, highlighting challenges faced by American companies from governments increasing online censorship. He emphasized the importance of U.S. government support in resisting such trends but did not specify specific actions toward this goal.
“In the past four years, when even the U.S. government has pushed for censorship,” Zuckerberg remarked. “By targeting us and other American companies, it has encouraged other governments to take even more drastic measures.”
In recent years, the government’s dealings with social media companies have faced significant scrutiny from Republican politicians who have alleged censorship. Following the 2016 election, Meta and other social media firms intensified their moderation efforts and regularly engaged with representatives from the FBI and other government bodies to combat foreign interference. As Republicans started questioning government interactions with social media platforms, these meetings became the focus of congressional investigations spearheaded by conservative figures like Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio.
In 2022, Zuckerberg defended the company’s engagements with agencies such as the FBI, labeling it a “legitimate institution” during an interview with podcaster Joe Rogan. Scrutiny also intensified on communications between the White House and social media companies, particularly concerning posts related to the Covid pandemic and vaccines. In August, Zuckerberg disclosed that the Biden White House had pressured Meta to take action against certain Covid-related content, a move he criticized as inappropriate.
In June, the Supreme Court dismissed claims that the government had improperly coerced social media companies to remove content. Nevertheless, the issue has remained politically charged, amplified by Musk’s acquisition of X (formerly Twitter) and his efforts to overhaul the platform’s moderation policies. Zuckerberg has previously commended Musk’s management of X, despite occasional spats that even involved discussions of a potential cage match.
Musk shared a screenshot of a headline regarding the Meta news on X later that Tuesday morning. “This is cool,” he commented.
