Meta’s Fact-Checking Partners Say They Were ‘Blindsided’ by Decision to Axe Them

Matter fact-checking partners claimed they were “blindsided” by the company’s decision. Abandon third-party fact checking Facebook, Instagram and Threads favor a community note model, and some say they are now scrambling to figure out if they can survive this hole in their funding.

“We heard the news like everyone else,” said Alan Duke, co-founder and editor-in-chief of the fact-checking site Lead Stories, which began working with Meta in 2019. “No advance notice.”

The news was announced that Meta no longer plans to use their services A blog post by Joel Kaplan, Chief Global Affairs Officer Tuesday morning and an accompanying video from Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Instead, the company plans to rely on X-style community notes, which allow users to flag content they think is incorrect or needs further explanation.

meta Partners with dozens of fact-checking organizations and newsrooms around the world, including 10 located in the United States, where Meta’s new rules will be implemented first

“We were blindsided by it,” Jesse Stiller, managing editor of Meta fact-checking partner Check Your Facts, told Wired. His company started working with Meta in 2019 and has 10 people working in their newsroom. “It was completely unexpected and out of left field for us We weren’t aware that this decision was being considered until Mark dropped the video overnight.”

News organizations that have partnered with Meta since 2016 to combat the spread of confusion on the platform are scrambling to figure out how the change will affect them.

“We have no idea what the website looks like going forward,” Stiller said.

Duke said Lead Stories had a diversified revenue stream and most of its operations outside the US, but claimed the decision would affect them. “The most painful part of this is losing some very good experienced journalists, who will no longer be paid to research false claims found on the Meta platform,” Duke said.

For others the financial impact is more severe. An editor at a U.S.-based fact-checking firm that works with Meta, who was not authorized to speak on the record, told Wired that Meta’s decision is “ultimately going to knock us out.”

Meta did not respond to requests for comment on its partners’ complaints or the financial impact of its decision on some companies.

“Meta doesn’t hate fact-checkers, but it knows that by pulling this partnership it is removing a very important source of funding for the global ecosystem,” said Alexios Mantzarlis, who helped establish the first partnership between fact-checkers and Facebook in 2015. and 2019 as director of the International Fact Checking Network.

Meta’s partners were also angered by Zuckerberg’s accusations that fact checkers had become too biased.

According to Duke, it is disappointing to hear Mark Zuckerberg accuse the organizations in Matter US third-party fact-checking program of being “too politically biased”. “Let me check the facts. Lead Stories follows the highest journalistic standards and ethics required by the International Fact-Checking Network Code of Ethics. We fact-check false claims regardless of where they originate from across the political spectrum.”