eta announced on Friday that it will integrate content from major news organizations into its artificial intelligence assistant to provide real-time information to users on Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp.
The social media giant said Meta AI will provide breaking news, entertainment and lifestyle articles when users ask news-related questions, leveraging partnerships with news organizations such as CNN, Fox News, Le Monde, People and USA Today.
The feature will allow users to access “more diverse content sources” and receive links to partner websites to dig deeper into stories, Mehta said in a blog post.
Mehta said the enhancements aim to make AI assistants “more responsive, accurate, and balanced” by incorporating diverse perspectives, recognizing that “real-time events can be difficult for current AI systems to keep up with.”
Initial partnerships span mainstream and conservative-leaning publications, including the Daily Caller and the Washington Examiner.
The company said it plans to continue adding partnerships and developing new features as technology companies increase competition to improve the capabilities of their AI assistants.
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Meta AI is available across the company's platforms, serving billions of users around the world.
The announcement comes as artificial intelligence companies such as ChatGPT and Google's Gemini increasingly incorporate live web content and news feeds.
Mr. Mehta has had a hot and cold relationship with the press over the years.
The company, founded by Mark Zuckerberg in 2004, declared that news made up a very small portion of user engagement on its platform and began shutting down the Facebook News tab in markets such as the US, UK and France.
This also ended multi-million dollar contracts with major news organizations.
Zuckerberg also aligned more closely with the Trump administration's antipathy toward establishment news, making the surprising decision in January to shut down Meta's U.S. fact-checking program.
The plan employed third-party fact-checkers, many from news organizations such as AFP, to debunk misinformation spread on the platform.
