Meta announced it will begin testing its new Community Notes feature across Facebook, Instagram, and Threads in the United States starting March 18. This marks the beginning of Meta’s transition away from its third-party fact-checking program, which the company revealed in January it would discontinue in favor of a crowd-sourced model.
Community Notes is designed to allow users to add context to posts, similar to the existing system used by X (formerly Twitter). Meta said, “We expect Community Notes to be less biased than the third party fact checking program it replaces because it allows more people with more perspectives to add context to posts.”
Initially, notes written by contributors will not appear publicly. Meta plans to gradually and randomly admit participants from a pool of roughly 200,000 people who have signed up across the three platforms. The system will be tested internally to ensure its functionality before any public deployment.
Meta emphasized that it is taking a deliberate and measured approach. “We’re going to take time to do this right,” the company said. Contributors must meet eligibility criteria, including being over 18 years old, having an account in good standing that’s over six months old, and either a verified phone number or enrollment in two-factor authentication.
Notes will be limited to 500 characters and must include a source link. Initially, contributors will remain anonymous, with author names withheld to encourage unbiased evaluations of the context provided. The feature will launch in six languages commonly used in the United States: English, Spanish, Chinese, Vietnamese, French, and Portuguese.
According to Meta, contributors will not be permitted to submit notes on advertisements but will be allowed to annotate posts by Meta, public figures, and political accounts. The system will also be inaccessible for content moderation penalties; unlike previous fact checks, Community Notes will not reduce a post’s distribution or visibility.
Meta said, “This isn’t majority rules. No matter how many contributors agree on a note, it won’t be published unless people who normally disagree decide that it provides helpful context.”
To build the rating system, Meta is adopting X’s open-source algorithm as a foundation. This algorithm will help assess agreement across different viewpoints by evaluating contributors’ historical ratings and identifying those who typically disagree. Meta plans to refine the system over time based on real-world testing and contributor feedback.
“We’re building this in the open while learning from contributors and seeing how it works in practice in our products,” the company stated. Meta acknowledged that the process will not be perfect and committed to ongoing improvements.
Once Meta is confident in the effectiveness of the system, Community Notes will fully replace third-party fact-checking in the United States. At that point, no new third-party fact check labels will be applied, though former fact-checkers will be welcome to participate as contributors.
“Our intention is ultimately to roll out this new approach to our users all over the world, but we won’t be doing that immediately,” Meta said. Until then, the existing third-party fact-checking program will continue operating outside the United States.
Image: Meta