In a video message posted to his Facebook page on Tuesday, Meta’s CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, announced the platform is getting rid of its third-party factcheckers, starting in the United States. While the measure seems to be sparing Europe, for the time being at least, the European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) is calling on Europe’s political decision-makers to take all necessary measures to support journalism and journalists, against a backdrop of increasing proliferation of disinformation and propaganda on online platforms.
Less than two weeks before Donald Trump returns to the White House, Meta (Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram and Threads) announced major changes to content moderation by getting rid of factcheckers in the US. Zuckerberg said Meta’s “factcheckers have just been too politically biased and have destroyed more trust than they’ve created”. Meta said it would rely on the plaform users to check each other’s posts in a system of “community notes” similar to the one adopted by Elon Musk on X. Zuckerberg made clear Meta’s move was a response to the incoming Donald Trump presidency.
On Wednesday the Nobel peace prize-winning journalist Maria Ressa predicted “extremely dangerous times” for journalism and democracy. She said Meta was going to “allow lies, anger, fear and hate to infect every single person on the platform”.
In the European Union, under the EU Digital Services Act (DSA), online platforms as Facebook and Instagram are required to counter illegal content online and mitigate against disinformation or election manipulation. Meta does not have the option of removing European fact-checkers without first conducting a risk-assessment report to be submitted to the European Commission demonstrating that the measure will have no effect on misinformation or electoral manipulation.
As Senior Research Associate at the Reuters Institute Rasmus Kleis Nielsen pointed out on Wednesday, Meta, in its 2024 EU DSA Systemic Risk Assessment and Mitigation Report, proudly praised the success of its collaboration with European fact-checkers, writing it “forms the basis to prevent the spread of large scale misinformation and disinformation”.
“The turnaround or hypocrisy of oligarch Zuckerberg and his clear collusion with Elon Musk and Donald Trump must prompt European policymakers to consolidate the integrity of the legitimate media ecosystem, in the face of platforms transformed into massive weapons of public opinion intoxication,” reacted EFJ President Maja Sever. “The work of journalists is more necessary than ever in the face of digital platforms’ capacity to cause harm. We must support information professionals to safeguard democracy. Europe cannot remain silent and passive in the face of this global threat”.
“At a time when many media outlets are facing economic difficulties due to the plundering of editorial content and advertising revenues by digital platforms,” added EFJ General Secretary Ricardo Gutiérrez, “it’s time for European policymakers to protect the newsrooms that employ real journalists whose mission is to verify facts, investigate and decode the news in the public interest. Media outlets that employ professional journalists, offer them decent working conditions and submit to the moral authority of independent self-regulatory bodies such as press councils, are the best antidote to the misinformation spread by digital platforms”.
Source: EFJ
