Google searches for "how to cancel and delete Facebook, Instagram and Threads accounts" have exploded in the U.S. since Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced the company would end its third-party fact-checking system, relax its content moderation policies and remove previous limits on the amount of political content in users' feeds.
Experts believe the move is an effort to cater to the incoming Trump administration and avoid political retaliation. The ramifications of Meta's new policy could have serious implications for the types of posts, hateful and violent speech, and misinformation that could spread faster on the Meta platform than they do now.
Bounce back quickly. This week, and especially the past two days, there has been a spike in search interest in quitting the Meta platform. Google searches for terms like "How to delete Facebook permanently" have a maximum score of 100 - the highest possible interest level on Google Trends.
According to GoogleTrends, related searches such as "How to delete all photos on Facebook", "Facebook alternatives", "How to log out of Facebook", "How to delete thread account" and "How to delete Instagram account without logging in" have become popular searches, with a sudden increase in popularity of more than 5000% compared to the previous period.
The explosive growth highlights backlash over Meta's decision to remove protections against hate speech and inflammatory political content.
Meta implemented fact-checking and content moderation policies after years of widespread misinformation and violent rhetoric on its platform, causing real-world harm. For example, the attempted insurrection at the Capitol on January 6, 2021, was sparked by coordinated calls for violence on Facebook and Instagram. Internal documents show that while Facebook has found ways to reduce the spread of political polarization, conspiracy theories and incitement to violence, Facebook did not take strong enough action against the "Stop the Steal" campaign promoted by Trump allies.
Meta also admitted that its platform was used to incite violence in Myanmar, where members of the Myanmar military committed genocide against the Rohingya people.
In 2021, Zuckerberg said the Meta community "doesn't want politics and fighting to take over their experience on our services," which led to the company's efforts to reduce political speech. Last year, the company also stopped proactively recommending political content to users on Instagram and Threads, a move that sparked controversy among creators and users. Now, Meta will gradually restore political content.
Zuckerberg said the new policy was an effort to restore free speech on the Meta platform, echoing comments Elon Musk made on his platform X. The Meta CEO noted that his platform will replace third-party fact-checkers with a community notes system similar to X, where users can flag posts they feel need more context.
During the same period, Google searches for "Facebook alternatives" also increased significantly, as did searches for Bluesky and Mastodon, two decentralized social media platforms that have been growing in popularity since Elon Musk took over Twitter and renamed it X.
Mastodon's CEO Eugen Rochko spoke about Meta's content moderation changes this week, calling the changes "a concert for anyone with a conscience." He also noted that users who cross-post from Threads to Mastodon via Threads’ fediverse sharing feature will be monitored on Mastodon for hate speech and platform policy violations.