Meta is ending its fact-checking program
Meta will stop using third-party fact-checkers on Facebook, Threads and Instagram, a policy once instituted to curtail the spread of misinformation across the tech company’s social media platforms. Meta will instead rely on users to add notes to posts that may be false or misleading.
The reversal is a stark sign of how Meta is repositioning itself for the Trump presidency. The company recently gave a heads-up to Trump officials about the change, according to a person with knowledge of the conversations. Mark Zuckerberg, the chief executive of Meta, also said on Monday that it had added to the company’s board Dana White, the head of Ultimate Fighting Championship and a longtime friend of Trump.
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. He conceded that the decision would result in more “bad stuff” on the platforms, calling it a “trade-off” for the reduction in the number of “innocent people’s posts and accounts that we accidentally take down.”
Reactions: Several digital rights groups condemned the decision, even as Donald Trump and his conservative allies praised the change. The president-elect has acknowledged that the decision was “probably” related to threats he had made against Meta and Zuckerberg.
Could the U.S. take Greenland — or Canada?
In a rambling news conference yesterday, Trump refused to rule out the use of military or economic coercion to force Panama to give up control of the canal that the U.S. built more than a century ago or to compel Denmark to sell Greenland.
His desire to expand the U.S. footprint is in step with his mind-set of making whatever he controls as big as possible, going back to his series of real estate acquisitions in the late 1980s, and he has suggested that Greenland could be necessary for the national security of the U.S. “It might be that you’ll have to do something,” he said.
It was not clear how serious the president-elect was in making some of his comments. At one point, he suggested that his administration would rename the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America.
Canada: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau reacted angrily to Trump’s threat to use “economic force” against Canada to acquire it, writing on social media: “There isn’t a snowball’s chance in hell that Canada would become part of the United States.”
Panama: Few appeared to be taking Trump’s threats very seriously, but Panama’s foreign minister, Javier Martínez-Acha, stressed that the canal’s sovereignty was “nonnegotiable,” saying: “Let it be clear: The canal belongs to the Panamanians and it will continue to be that way.”
Related: The second Trump presidency has unprecedented potential for conflicts of interest across deals in real estate, cryptocurrency and sports.
Scores of people died in an earthquake in China
At least 126 people have died and nearly 200 were injured in a magnitude 7.1 earthquake in Dingri County, near one of Tibet’s most historic cities, in western China, state media reported. The quake was the country’s deadliest 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 the delivery of resources difficult.
On the ground: With temperatures in the region reaching as low as 5 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 15 Celsius), rescue workers had a short window to locate survivors.
MORE TOP NEWS
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 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: Peter Yarrow, of Peter, Paul and Mary, the folk trio behind gentle hits like “Puff the Magic Dragon,” died at 86.
CONVERSATION STARTERS
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Turn the page: Writers, artists and a social worker shared their favorite tips to help you start and maintain a journal.
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The one who got away: Fleeing fraud charges, Samuele Landi went to sea and evaded extradition treaties. He took advantage of all the offshore world had to offer.
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A dangerous byproduct: Mining operations in the Roman Empire led to widespread lead exposure. It might have been the world’s first case of widespread industrial pollution.
ARTS AND IDEAS
Where will you go this year?
England will honor the author Jane Austen on the 250th anniversary of her birth. New York City will celebrate four major museum reopenings. In Koh Samui, Thailand, fans of “The White Lotus” can walk the sandy beaches and jungle where the upcoming season was filmed. And exploring Angola’s tropical beaches, waterfalls and national parks has never been easier.
All of these places are our Travel desk’s “52 Places to Go in 2025” this year. Read the list, and mark off the destinations you’d most like to go.
