AWhen Meta announces the end of fact-checking and tensions rise between Europe and European freedom of expression.
The Point: Meta announced the end of fact-checking. What does this mean in practice? Is democracy in danger?
Fabrice Epelboin: Saying that Meta is putting an end to fact-checking does not mean the disappearance of all filters on the platform. Content that is illegal in the eyes of the law will always be censored. In reality, moderation mechanisms are evolving. Instead of relying on teams of fact-checkers, Meta will now favor tools like community notes.
Community notes consist of letting pre-qualified users add disconfirmations or contextual annotations themselves under publications, then voting to make a note visible to everyone or, on the contrary, bury it. It is a participatory mechanism, already used on X, and which gives greater responsibility to the community to identify and contextualize misleading content. These notes aim to replace the role played by traditional fact-checkers until now, but without the same centralization, and without institutional intervention.
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However, this development raises concerns […] Read more
