Current and former Meta employees say the company's lawyers systematically suppressed internal research on child safety risks in its VR products.
A group of current and former Meta employees has accused the company of systematically suppressing its own research into child safety risks on its virtual reality platforms, according to documents disclosed to the U.S. Congress on September 8.
The whistleblowers, represented by the legal nonprofit Whistleblower Aid, allege Meta’s legal team actively vetoed, edited, and buried sensitive findings. They claim this was a deliberate strategy to create “plausible deniability” against potential lawsuits and regulatory action.
This alleged strategy began after the 2021 Frances Haugen leaks and directly contradicts public safety commitments from CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Meta has vehemently denied the claims, calling them a mischaracterization of its efforts to conduct high-quality research while complying with global privacy laws.
The disclosures paint a picture of a company whose public statements on safety are at odds with its alleged internal practices.
In October 2021, following the Haugen revelations, CEO Mark Zuckerberg publicly vowed, “we’re going to keep doing research because it’s the right thing to do,” resisting tendencies to avoid scrutiny in a post at the time.
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