Mehta's changes to police could lead to clashes with EU and UK, experts say | meta

Major changes to the policies of the Metas social media platform have put the tech company at odds with lawmakers in Britain and the European Union, experts and politicians said.

Lawmakers in Brussels and London have criticized Mark Zuckerberg's decision to abolish fact-checkers for Facebook, Instagram and Threads in the United States, with one lawmaker calling it “very scary.”

Changes to Metas' global policy on hateful content now include allowing users to call transgender people hateful and include the following guidelines: We allow claims of mental illness or abnormality based on gender or sexual orientation.

Chi Onwurah, a Labor lawmaker and chair of the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee, which is investigating how online disinformation sparked last summer's riots, said Zuckerberg would replace professional fact-checkers with users who would moderate the accuracy of posts. He said his decision was concerning and quite frightening. .

After hearing that Meta is removing all fact-checking tools. [in the US] She said it was about people's right to be protected from the harmful effects of misinformation. The fact that Zuckerberg has said he is following X's example raises concerns when you compare that X is a far greater platform for misinformation than Facebook.

Meta said it would rely on social media users to check each other's posts in a community notes system similar to the one Elon Musk adopted at X. This has raised concerns about misinformation coming out of the United States on issues including elections, health, epidemics and pandemics. Armed conflicts and leaks into digital feeds around the world, where Meta has over 3 billion users.

On Wednesday, Nobel Peace Prize-winning American-Filipino journalist Maria Ressa predicted extremely dangerous times ahead for journalism, democracy and social media users. She faced criminal charges after publishing an article critical of former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte. She said meta will allow lies, anger, fear and hatred to infect everyone on the platform.

Meta's move, which Zuckerberg made clear, was a response to the election of incoming President Donald Trump, and also prompted predictions that a major challenge to laws such as online safety laws was coming from the Trump administration.

Damian Collins, the former British technology secretary, said the challenge would likely come through trade deals that would pressure Britain to accept American standards for digital regulation.

He said: We must stand firm against such proposals. Doing so eliminates the possibility of holding technology executives accountable and requiring them to enforce safety standards for their platforms that are mandated by our laws.

Mehta whistleblower told the Guardian: I am very concerned about what this means for teenagers.

Arturo Bjar, former chief engineer responsible for child safety measures at Meta, said: “Meta will become increasingly exposed to all categories of content that need to be protected.

Harmful content, including violent or pornographic material, may be more accessible to younger users, Bejar said. It cited Zuckerberg's statement that handling lower-severity violations will now rely on users flagging content before Meta takes action.

In Brussels, the European Commission hit back at Zuckerberg's comments in which he cited Europe as home to a growing number of laws institutionalizing censorship, citing the EU's own Digital Services Act that regulates online content.

A spokesperson for the EU administration said: “We categorically refute all claims of censorship and nothing in the Digital Services Act compels, requests or requests platforms to remove lawful content.”

Zuckerberg has said his policy of ditching fact-checkers only applies to the United States for now, but his broader stance on Europe has raised concerns that he plans to implement this approach there.

Arnav Joshi, senior technology lawyer at law firm Clifford Chance, said Meta would face intense regulatory scrutiny in the UK and EU.

As we move from human fact-checkers to more automation, regulators will want to see evidence of the effectiveness of these changes, which has been difficult to quantify and justify in the past.

Valrie Hayer, member of the European Parliament and leader of the centrist Renew Europe group, said: “The EU will remain uncomfortable with social media giants by defending freedom of expression and the integrity and independence of democratic processes. Europe will never accept manipulation and disinformation as the norm in society. By abandoning fact-checking in the United States, Mehta is making a major strategic and ethical mistake.

Oliver Marsh, a former Downing Street adviser and head of technology research at the Berlin and Zurich non-profit Algorithmwatch, said: “If these policy changes allow them to spread lies that end up being attacks on groups, there is a possibility that Meta will go against the EU's Digital Services Act. The question is whether Zuckerberg cares about his decisions and whether he will impress Trump. With the growing likelihood of non-compliance with any enforcement measures to ban meth, the moment for the EU to decide whether it has the power to ban meth, or how it can be held to account, is getting closer.

Meta said content about suicide, self-harm and eating disorders would still be considered a high severity offense and would continue to use automated systems to detect high severity content, but British child protection charity the NSPCC expressed concerns. . .

Rani Govender, Online Child Safety Regulatory Policy Manager, said: Meta must explain how removing its fact-checking program in the US and changing its content policy will not increase the risk of harm to children in the UK.

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