Soon to be out of a job, Metas fact-checkers battle a blaze of wildfire conspiracy theories | Money [Video]

Los Angeles (CNN) — Just hours after Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg announced last Tuesday that the social media giant would eliminate its US-based fact-checkers, the iconic hills above Los Angeles began to smolder.

As fire crews scrambled in vain to contain the resulting firestorm, the fact-checking partners, still working for Meta, took on their own fight: trying to slow viral misinformation rapidly spreading around the wildfires.

Rumor and speculation about the disaster began to swirl online like glowing embers, before eventually becoming a wild blaze of vast conspiracy theories.

“Cutting fact checkers from social platforms is like disbanding your fire department,” said Alan Duke, a former CNN journalist who co-founded the fact-checking outlet Lead Stories, one of dozens of such organizations around the world funded by Meta.

Meta has not announced when it will formally end its fact-checking program, but a person familiar with the program said it could be eliminated as soon as March. The decision will force some of Meta’s fact-checking partners …