Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Meta, previously known as Facebook, reportedly rejected requests to expand the company’s child safety and well-being teams in 2021, as revealed by internal documents and emails released by Congress.
The vice president of global affairs, Nick Clegg, urged Zuckerberg to hire 45 more employees focused on preventing bullying, harassment, and self-harm. This request came amidst growing concerns about the impact of Meta’s products on young people’s mental health, expressed by politicians in the US, UK, EU, and Australia.
Other top executives at Meta, including Naomi Gleit, Chris Cox, and Sheryl Sandberg, endorsed Clegg’s proposal to expand the child safety and well-being teams, as per the emails obtained by Bloomberg.
The internal communications at Meta were released by the Senate Judiciary Committee ahead of a hearing where Zuckerberg and other chief executives are set to testify on online child sexual exploitation and the impact of social media on children.
Despite the initial request being rejected in August 2021, Clegg followed up with a revised proposal for a smaller number of new hires in November 2021, acknowledging that the original proposal was not funded.
These developments took place against the backdrop of the release of the ‘Facebook Files,’ leaked by whistleblower Frances Haugen, a former Facebook data engineer. The Wall Street Journal published a comprehensive investigation based on these internal documents, raising significant concerns about Meta’s operations.
