87% of Brazilians believe that it is the responsibility of Meta to remove content when there is a risk to public safety

On January 7, Meta owner Mark Zuckerberg announced an end to fact-checking by agencies specializing in the company's platforms, which includes WhatsApp, Facebook and Instagram, replacing the policy with ''The’ Community Notes in the coming months.To understand Brazilians' perception of the new guidelines, the Sherlock Communications conducted a survey that recorded users' experiences with fake news and other abuses on social media platforms. 

The vast majority of Brazilians interviewed (87%) say that it should be a legal requirement for the Meta irexpress content, disable accounts and work with law enforcement authorities when they believe there is a real risk of physical harm or direct threats to public safety.’* 

Although fact-checking is still active in Latin America, the results show the impact of misinformation and its reflection on user behavior.In Brazil, the STF (Supreme Federal Court) closely follows the changes and debates the responsibility of platforms on the content published.

The survey revealed that in Brazil, more than half of the participants (54%) said they had seen fake news on Meta platforms and about a third (29%) came to believe in the content before discovering that it was disinformation. In addition, almost half (46%) of Brazilian users say they avoid interacting, commenting, sharing and liking posts containing fake content; 35% report the post to the moderators of the platform, and 15%am add public comments warning that the content is fake.

For fact-checking, 57% use internet searches, while 53% consult trusted news outlets.However, 33% read comments to assess the veracity of the post. The same percentage searches for information on other social networks, and 9% use artificial intelligence tools such as ChatGPT for research.

Outside the Meta ecosystem, the most used applications by Brazilians are YouTube (91%), TikTok (60%) and Telegram (48%). Among Meta platforms, WhatsApp is the most used app, with 80% of users accessing it at least once an hour, followed by Instagram (54%) and Facebook (27%) at the same frequency.

Despite the strong presence of Meta, 38% of users consider migrating to another platform if the company actually suspends fact-checking in the country, while 43% say they would remain. The migration trend to other platforms with the suspension of fact-checking also shows strong in other Latin American countries. Peru leads, with 53% of respondents considering the change, followed by Mexico (48%), Colombia (46%), Chile (45%) and Argentina (43%).

“According to this research, Meta's decision to end fact-checking in the U. S. would not be as popular with its users in Latin America. Large technology companies should be aware of how the introduction of changes like this affect their reputations in Latin America, influencing not only their credibility but also the adoption of the platform and user engagement across the” region''' says Patrick O’Neill, managing partner at Sherlock Communications.

Other research data

• Brazil leads the daily use of Instagram (85%), WhatsApp (96%) and Threads (22%), compared to other countries in Latin America. 
• More than 40% of the Brazilians interviewed have already encountered hate speech (offensive comments related to race, ethnicity, religion, gender and others) on Meta platforms.
• Regarding the complaints, 22% of the Brazilians interviewed said they had already reported and were satisfied with the response, 19% had already reported and did not obtain a satisfactory response and 12% said they were ignored by the platform.

Methodology

The research was conducted by Broadminded, the research unit of Sherlock Communications, and takes into account the anonymous response of 3222 people in Latin America, being from Argentina (455), Brazil (635), Chile (411), Colombia (428), Peru (658) and Mexico (635), obtained in January 2025 through an online questionnaire.

• *The excerpt: irexpress content, disable accounts and work with law enforcement when they believe there is a real risk of physical harm or direct threats to public safety, cited at the beginning of the content, it was removed from the Meta website for the elaboration of the research.