Facebook Whistleblower Fallout Prompts a Push to Calm Employees

Executives additionally distributed an inventory of speaking factors, a duplicate of which was obtained by The Instances, so staff knew what to say if family and friends requested them about “latest occasions.” That record included a denial that Fb places revenue and development above individuals’s security and the way the corporate has referred to as for rules from the federal government.

In Mr. Zuckerberg’s often scheduled question-and-answer session with staff, which came about on Thursday, he defended Fb and disputed Ms. Haugen’s characterizations, in response to the recording of the assembly.

“We care deeply about points like security and well-being and psychological well being,” he stated at one level. “So if you see press protection that simply misrepresents our work and takes that out of context after which makes use of that to inform narratives which can be false about our motives, it’s actually exhausting and disheartening to see that.”

Between questions on a crippling Facebook outage on Monday, when all the firm’s apps grew to become inaccessible globally for greater than 5 hours, and points surrounding labor certification for overseas staff, Mr. Zuckerberg additionally argued that Fb spent way more on analysis and security than bigger corporations corresponding to Google, Apple and Microsoft.

He assured staff that Fb would ultimately come out for the higher.

“The trail to the long run just isn’t easy, proper? It’s not this, like this straight line,” Mr. Zuckerberg stated. “You recognize, typically, you get thrashed.”

Exterior of the assembly, staff have had livid debates about Ms. Haugen and her claims. Some have argued that Fb ought to invite her to talk at a companywide assembly, in response to messages seen by The Instances. One stated that her testimony was a “wake-up name” for Fb that felt lengthy overdue.

However different staff questioned Ms. Haugen’s motives, her background and her credentials. In a single inner message, an worker stated Ms. Haugen was “clueless.” Some stated she lacked technical data.