A former senior Facebook executive has revealed how the social media giant allegedly worked closely with the Chinese government to explore ways to allow Beijing to censor and control content within China.
In an exclusive interview with the BBC, Sarah Wynn-Williams, who once served as Facebook’s global public policy director, disclosed that Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s founder, considered allowing the Chinese government to block viral posts until they could be reviewed by Chinese authorities. This was reportedly in exchange for access to China’s vast market of hundreds of millions of potential users.
Wynn-Williams, in her new book, also filed a whistleblower complaint with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), accusing Meta, Facebook’s parent company, of misleading investors. The BBC has reviewed the complaint.
In response, Meta stated that Wynn-Williams was terminated from the company in 2017 for poor performance. The company also confirmed that while Facebook once explored entering China, it ultimately chose not to move forward with those plans. “We ultimately opted not to go through with the ideas we’d explored,” a Meta spokesperson said.
- Facebook has been at the center of controversy before, and these new revelations add to the conversation. Wynn-Williams claims that Zuckerberg’s obsessive desire to expand Facebook into China—despite the country’s censorship laws—was a constant point of focus for him. “China is Mark Zuckerberg’s white whale,” she stated, referencing Zuckerberg’s relentless pursuit of the Chinese market, which remains one of the largest untapped social media markets globally, but where Facebook is still banned.
Wynn-Williams further alleges that Facebook was prepared to provide China with access to Chinese citizens’ user data as part of negotiations, claiming that Facebook worked “hand in glove” with the Chinese Communist Party. She also states that the company made special arrangements with the Chinese government to allow Chinese officials to test Facebook’s censorship tools.
In addition to these allegations, Wynn-Williams claims that Facebook used algorithms to identify vulnerable teenagers and track their emotional states, targeting them for advertising. She described feeling “sick” about the company’s use of these algorithms, which she says were intended to maximize engagement by exploiting young users’ vulnerabilities.
Meta, however, has denied these claims. The company asserts that it never offered tools to target people based on their emotional state, and that its previous research aimed to help marketers understand how users express themselves on Facebook.
Wynn-Williams’ whistleblower complaints also include accusations of misleading statements made by Zuckerberg and other Meta executives in response to congressional inquiries about Facebook’s operations in China.
Amid these growing concerns, Wynn-Williams has called for more transparency and greater focus on the safety of young people on social media. She urges Meta to prioritize addressing these issues, given its influence on daily life and the immense impact it has on global affairs.
In light of these new revelations, Meta has launched legal action to prevent further distribution of what it calls “defamatory and untrue information” from Wynn-Williams’ book. However, Wynn-Williams maintains that her memoir speaks for itself, aiming to hold the company accountable for its actions.
As the legal battle continues, the question remains whether these allegations will impact Meta’s standing and influence, particularly in the face of increasing scrutiny from governments, regulators, and the public.
- Source BBC
