A bipartisan group of senators requested paperwork from Meta on Tuesday on its security analysis and insurance policies after a number of whistleblowers accused the corporate of stifling inner research on security dangers.
In a letter to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Sens. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and 6 others pressed the tech big in regards to the “disturbing” allegations.
“Despite repeated assurances from you and other Meta executives that your company has finally begun prioritizing children’s safety, these disclosures suggest that Meta executives instead have systemically covered up risks and blocked research, even as it worked to expand potentially unsafe products to young teens and children,” the senators wrote.
Six present and former Meta workers have accused the corporate of doctoring and proscribing inner analysis into security considerations, significantly concerning younger customers on its digital and augmented actuality platforms.
They allege that Meta started limiting security analysis to ascertain believable deniability after Fb whistleblower Frances Haugen disclosed a trove of paperwork in 2021, together with inner analysis indicating the corporate was conscious of its platforms’ unfavorable psychological well being results on teenage ladies.
“Meta appears to have walked away from—and even obstructed—research into and remedies for the toxic impacts of its products, while misrepresenting the effectiveness of its efforts and lobbying against legislation that would legally require such precautions,” the senators added in Tuesday’s letter.
They’ve requested Meta to supply any inner analysis into the prevalence of harms to younger customers on its platforms, the existence of customers youthful than 13 and the use and effectiveness of parental controls.
The senators are additionally in search of info on the corporate’s insurance policies and procedures used to evaluation analysis proposals, along with any analysis functions associated to younger customers and whether or not they have been rejected or altered.
Meta has dismissed the whistleblower allegations as “nonsense,” arguing the claims are based mostly on “selectively leaked internal documents” meant to “craft a false narrative” and emphasizing there was not a “blanket prohibition on conducting research with young people.”
