MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
Meta, the company that owns Facebook and Instagram, announced this week that it is getting rid of fact-checking in the United States. In a video statement, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg laid out the reason. Quote, "the fact-checkers have just been too politically biased and have destroyed more trust than they have created."
The decision raises questions about the type of content that might flourish on Facebook and Instagram going forward - questions that I put today to Michael McConnell. He is co-chair of the Meta Oversight Board, which was established by Meta to review content moderation policies and decisions. Now, Meta is among NPR's sponsors, but we report on them like any other company. So I asked Michael McConnell whether he agreed with Mark Zuckerberg's reasoning.
MICHAEL MCCONNELL: I think there's pretty overwhelming evidence that the fact-checkers corrected much more content from the right side of the spectrum than the left side of the spectrum. The disagreement is about the reasons why. You know, there are some people, mostly on the left, of course, who say, well, that's because there's so much more misinformation coming from the right, but this is a very difficult thing to measure.
KELLY: I mean, the origin, as I understand it, of the whole fact-checking program in the first place was the 2016 election, when Russia used Facebook and other platforms, as Facebook has acknowledged, to spread false claims, trying to influence American voters. And we've seen Russia and foreign actors continue to do that in every election since. Do you have concerns about where this could leave us for 2026, 2028?
MCCONNELL: Well, we'll have to see. I'm not, you know, overly confident that this is going to be the solution. There is really no magic bullet to this problem. But much of this has to do with not whether the information is true or false but where it's coming from. So when foreign governments are spreading propaganda, the problem with that is not that it's misinformation but that it's foreign government propaganda.
KELLY: We've been talking about challenges with disinformation, with how do you ascertain whether something is, quote-unquote, "true." There are other changes that Zuckerberg announced about Meta lifting some restrictions that were designed to curb hate speech, for example, allowing users to say that LGBTQ people are mentally ill or that women are property. Was there discussion about that on your board? How does that sit with you?
MCCONNELL: No. This actually came as a surprise to us. We did not know that they were going to be revising that standard.
KELLY: I mean, I'll let people listening know you're also a law professor at Stanford Law School. And this seems to speak to a natural tension over where the line should be when freedom of expression crosses toward harassment crosses toward hate speech. I guess I circle back to how Meta is going to navigate that line under this new policy, which - again, you can write that women are property, and it's not going to be fact-checked.
MCCONNELL: I I don't know about that particular example because I've actually never seen that particular claim being made. I don't know what - how it's articulated. But if you look at some of the other...
KELLY: It's on Meta's own website, the newly updated policy on hateful conduct. Yeah.
MCCONNELL: I've never seen an actual example. But some of the examples, I think, are fairly easy to understand. So, for example, they have been taking down a speech that advocates that single-sex bases be reserved to people who are biologically rather than gender-based of that sex. That's a very raging political debate in the United States, and to take down one side of that does seem to be loading the question.
KELLY: Can I ask just what's the conversation like on the board these days? Are your meetings contentious?
MCCONNELL: Oh, yes. I mean, for one thing, the oversight board is a global enterprise, and there's a huge difference in the way in which Americans think about freedom of speech and other places around the world. And that really plays out. It's also true that the fact-checking program has been much more contentious and controversial in the United States, not so much elsewhere. So this is a matter of very active and vigorous debate within the board.
KELLY: Does the timing of this raise any questions in your mind, coming less than two weeks before Trump's inauguration?
MCCONNELL: Well, I'm now speaking just for myself. This is not the oversight board speaking, but I do think that there's bad optics here, that it looks like and may be even the reality - I don't know. But it certainly looks like this is buckling to political pressure. I would have liked to have seen these reforms laid out, you know, in more - in less contentious and partisan times so that they would be considered on the merits rather than looking like this is - you know, Donald Trump is president, and now they're caving.
KELLY: Michael McConnell. He is co-chair of Meta's Oversight Board, also a professor at Stanford Law School. Michael McConnell, thanks for your time.
MCCONNELL: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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