Meta is ending its fact-checking program
Meta will stop using third-party fact-checkers on Facebook, Threads and Instagram. It will instead rely on users to add notes to posts that may be false or misleading, similar to a system used on X. Follow our live coverage.
The reversal is a stark sign of how Meta is repositioning itself for the Trump presidency, and few other big companies have worked as overtly to curry favor. The company recently gave a heads-up to Trump officials about the change, according to a person with knowledge of the conversations. Meta’s chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, also said yesterday that Meta had added Dana White, the head of Ultimate Fighting Championship and a longtime friend of Trump, to its board.
Zuckerberg said that the shift would begin in the U.S. in the coming months.
“It’s time to get back to our roots around free expression,” he said, adding that the current system had “reached a point where it’s just too many mistakes and too much censorship.” He conceded that there would be more “bad stuff” on the platform as a result of the decision, and called it a “trade-off” that would also result in fewer “innocent people’s posts” being taken down.
Reactions: The move seemed to please Trump. At a press event at Mar-a-Lago, the president-elect said that Meta had “come a long way.” He also conceded that the change was “probably” due to threats that he had made against Meta and Zuckerberg. His conservative allies were quick to hail the decision. Many of them felt that they had been unfairly targeted by the program. Several digital rights groups condemned the decision.
At least 126 died in an earthquake in Tibet
A magnitude 7.1 earthquake yesterday killed at least 126 people in Dingri County, near one of Tibet’s most historic cities, in western China. At least 188 were injured. The quake was the deadliest in the country since December 2023, when 151 people were killed in a magnitude 6.2 temblor in the northwestern provinces of Gansu and Qinghai.
China’s state broadcaster said that at least 1,000 homes had been damaged, and rescue efforts were being hampered by logistical challenges. The remoteness of the area, along the Himalayan border with Nepal, made delivering resources difficult. With temperatures in the region reaching as low as 5 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 15 Celsius), rescue workers had a short window to locate survivors.
U.S. officials said a genocide took place in Sudan
The U.S. declared yesterday that the Rapid Support Forces, a paramilitary group, and their allies had committed genocide in Sudan in their fight against the country’s military. The wave of violence took place in western Darfur, where men, boys and infants were targeted and murdered, and women were raped “on an ethnic basis,” Antony Blinken, the Secretary of State, said.
The genocide determination came after months of government deliberation as officials reviewed the merits of the case. The judgment might propel a new drive for accountability in Africa’s largest war, which has caused up to 150,000 deaths.
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Snakes vie for many of the same resources and spaces as people do, often with dire consequences. Venomous snakes kill about 120,000 people a year, most of them in parts of Africa that are far from clinics and populated by people too poor to afford proper care.
The problem was mostly ignored until recently, but scientists are now trying to better quantify it. Read more.
Lives lived: Jean-Marie Le Pen, the rabble-rousing founding father of France’s modern political far right, died at 96.
Peter Yarrow, of the folk trio Peter, Paul and Mary, known for hits like “Puff the Magic Dragon,” died at 86.
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Celebrate Austen’s England (and her birthday)
The author Jane Austen would have turned 250 this year, and celebrations abound throughout the year in southwest England. In bucolic Hampshire — which is home to her cottage, now a museum — Austen was at her most prolific as a novelist.
Austen’s former home is just one of the Travel desk’s favorite places this year. Its list of “52 Places to Go in 2025” also includes Assam, India, for tea gardens and pyramids, and Angola, for beaches and sacred waterfalls. In Koh Samui, Thailand, fans of the show “White Lotus” can walk the sandy beaches and jungle where the upcoming season was filmed.
