Meta fact-checkers call an emergency meeting after Mark Zuckerberg pulls the plug

• Meta ends US fact-checking partnerships and shifts to crowdsourced moderation tools.
• An international fact-checking network called an emergency meeting after the announcement.
• Meta's decision impacts the financial sustainability of fact-checking organizations.

The International Fact-Checking Network (IFCN) has convened an emergency meeting of its members following Meta's announcement on Tuesday that it will end its third-party fact-checking partnerships in the US and replace them with a crowdsourced moderation tool similar to X's Community Notes.

In an exclusive interview with Business Insider, IFCN Director Angie Holan confirmed that the meeting, scheduled for Wednesday, was organized in direct response to Meta's decision.

"We hold these meetings monthly, but we called this one specifically because of today's news," she said.

The meeting is expected to draw between 80 to 100 attendees from IFCN's network of fact-checkers, which spans 170 organizations worldwide. Not all of the attendees are Meta fact-checking partners, although many of them have a stake in the program's future and its global implications.

The IFCN has long played a crucial role in Meta's fact-checking ecosystem by accrediting organizations for Meta's third-party program, which began in 2016 after the U.S. presidential election.

IFCN certification signaled that a fact-checking organization met rigorous editorial and transparency standards. Meta's partnerships with these certified organizations became a cornerstone of its efforts to combat misinformation, focusing on flagging false claims, contextualizing misinformation, and curbing its spread.

"People are upset"

Holan described the mood among fact-checkers as somber and frustrated.

"This program has been a major part of the global fact-checking community's work for years," she said. "People are upset because they saw themselves as partners in good standing with Meta, doing important work to make the platform more accurate and reliable."

She noted that fact-checkers were not responsible for removing posts, only for labeling misleading content and limiting its virality.

"It was never about censorship but about adding context to prevent false claims from going viral," Holan said.

A last-minute heads-up

An employee at PolitiFact, one of the first news organizations to partner with Meta on its Third Party Fact-Checking program in December 2016, and who asked not to be named, said that the company received virtually no warning from Meta before killing the program.

"The PolitiFact team found out this morning at the same time as everyone else," the employee told BI.

An IFCN employee who wished to remain anonymous told BI that the organization itself only got a heads-up via email that something was coming "late yesterday" asking for a 6 a.m. call — about an hour before Meta's blog post written by its new Republican policy head Joel Kaplan went live.

"I had a feeling it was bad news," this employee said.

Business Insider has reached out to Meta for comment.

Financial fallout for fact-checkers

Meta's decision could have serious financial consequences for fact-checking organizations, especially those that relied heavily on funding from the platform.

According to a 2023 report published by the IFCN, income from Meta's third Party Fact-Checking Program and grants remain fact checkers' predominant revenue streams.

"Fact-checking isn't going away, and many robust organizations existed before Meta's program and will continue after it," Holan said. "But some fact-checking initiatives were created because of Meta's support, and those will be vulnerable."

She also underscored the broader challenges facing the industry, saying that fact-checking organizations share the same financial pressures as newsrooms. "This is bad news for the financial sustainability of fact-checking journalism," she said.

Skepticism toward Community Notes

Meta plans to replace its partnerships with Community Notes, a crowd-based system modeled after X's approach.

Holan however, expressed doubt that this model could serve as an effective substitute for expert-led fact-checking.

"Community Notes on X have only worked in cases where there's bipartisan agreement — and how often does that happen?" she asked. "When two political sides disagree, there's no independent way to flag something as false."

It's not clear so far how Meta's implementation of Community Notes will work.

"We'll be here after Meta"

Despite the uncertainty, Holan remains steadfast in IFCN's mission.

"The IFCN was here before Meta's program, and we'll be here after it," she said. "We may look different in size and scope, but we'll continue promoting the highest standards in fact-checking and connecting organizations that want to collaborate worldwide."

Holan emphasized that Wednesday's meeting will focus on supporting IFCN members as they navigate this transition.

"We're here to help them figure out the best way forward," she said.