‘Moral bankruptcy’: whistleblower offers scathing assessment of Facebook
Accumulate, accumulate! That is Moses and the prophets! - Karl Marx, Capital, volume 1, Chapter 24, Sec 3.
It might, as one senator put it, be remembered as “the big tobacco jaw-dropping moment of truth”. The truth-teller was former Facebook data scientist Frances Haugen, appearing on Capitol Hill on Tuesday to testify that the online platform knowingly harms children, just as cigarette makers did before they were brought to heel.
The whistleblower’s
inside knowledge and clear, crisp answers to senators’ questions – with
elaborate hand gestures for emphasis – was all the more damning because of her
measured tone and lack of hyperbole. “Facebook knows that they are leading
young users to anorexia content,” she said in a voice of authority that may
prove a tipping point in government efforts to curb the power of big tech.
She was clearly
preaching to the converted as senator after senator joined her in scathing
criticism of Mark Zuckerberg,
the founder and chief executive of Facebook, for putting profits before people….