After further revelations about Facebook’s failure to stop disinformation spreading, a former spokesperson for President Barack Obama’s Treasury Department calls for Mark Zuckerberg to resign as CEO.
Kara Alaimo is now an associate professor at Hofstra University’s Lawrence Herbert School of Communication. She claims that Zuckerberg has done little to address the problems with social media giants.
A whistleblower affidavit was submitted by a former Facebook employee. It accuses Facebook of prioritizing profits rather than their due diligence to combat hate, misinformation, or other threats to the public.
The new allegations were made anonymously and under penalty of perjury. They echo the claims made earlier by Frances Haugen (whistleblower), who testified in a scathing manner before Congress about Facebook’s moral failings.
Kara Alaimo, who is currently an associate professor at Hofstra University’s Lawrence Herbert School of Communication, believes that CEO Mark Zuckerberg should resign as the first step in fixing Facebook’s problems.
Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook, has a net worth of $122 billion. This makes him the 5th richest person in the world.
The most dramatic part of the affidavit is where the ex-employe laments over Facebook’s inability quickly to stop racial killings and massacres in Myanmar in 2017. In 2017, military officials used Facebook to spread hate speech.
Facebook is looking to change its name following all the negative publicity.
The company also hinted at plans for a “metaverse”, a virtual reality version that allows people to communicate, work, and play online.
Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of the tech giant, has been a leader in the discussion about the concept. It would blur the lines between digital and physical worlds.
It could be used to make someone feel like they are face-to-face with a friend despite being thousands miles away and connected via the internet.
Frances Haugen, Whistleblower, gave a fiery testimony to Congress earlier this month regarding Facebook’s moral failings.
Alaimo states that the company needs more than a cosmetic makeover.
She wrote in the op ed, “The place to begin is with Zuckerberg’s retirement.”
Alaimo stated that Zuckerberg can’t or won’t fix Facebook’s problems.
She wrote, “It’s evident that he lacks both the moral inclination and the ability to solve these problems.” He has to go. The company should immediately announce the appointment of a chief executive. It should be someone who is thoughtful, committed to transparency about social media’s effects on society, and who has both the will and the competence to steer the platform in a different direction.
Alaimo claims that Zuckerberg’s company, with nearly three billion users worldwide, has lost the public trust.
“It’s because the public has lost trust in Facebook. It’s a rightful statement. For all the family photos and funny videos that Facebook has made possible for families, ‘Facebook’ is now also associated in recent years to misinformation, privacy breaches, hate spreading, and autocracy.
Alaimo labels Facebook’s reputation “bankrupt” saying that the name will do little for public trust.
Haugen stated that Facebook is responsible for the January 6 Capitol insurrection
According to the company, it was more or less “stumbled” onto the riot that resulted in five deaths
Facebook’s scandalous allegations by Frances Haugen, a former employee, that the company knew about its toxic effects on society for years and has done little to correct them have triggered a global reckoning.
“Facebook can only restore trust by changing its leadership and addressing the actual issues that have caused so much concern.”
This is the first time such accusations have been levelled against the company since internal memos were released, and testimony given by Haugen.
Haugen and Haugen’s new whistleblower also filed the allegations to Securities and Exchange Commission. The Commission oversees all publicly traded corporations.
The anonymous ex employee claims that Facebook officials routinely undermined efforts to combat misinformation and hate speech in order to avoid angering then-President Donald Trump.
The former employee stated that Facebook’s Public Policy Team had once protected a ‘whitelist’ that exempted Breitbart and other Trump-aligned publishers, from Facebook’s regular rules against spreading fake News.
Alaimo believes that the company should announce a chief executive with all possible haste.
Haugen blames Facebook for knowing that Instagram harmed young girls body image. He even tried to find ways to appeal to toddlers through ‘exploring playdates to be a growth lever’.
Ultimately, Alaimo argues, ‘changing a name won’t change reality.’
The complaints come after Haugen’s testimony before Congress in early October, where she claimed Facebook promoted divisiveness as a way to keep people on the site, with Haugen saying the documents showed the company had failed to protect young users.
It also revealed that Instagram had a negative effect on young girls’ bodies. The company even tried to come up with ways to appeal toddlers through ‘exploring playdates to grow’.
“The company’s leadership is aware of how to make Facebook safer and Instagram more secure, but they are unwilling to make the necessary changes as they have put their astronomical profits ahead of people. Haugen stated that Congress must act at a hearing.
Haugen, who anonymously filed eight grievances against her former employer with US Securities and Exchange Commission earlier this month, said to 60 Minutes: ‘Facebook has repeatedly shown that it prefers safety over profit.
She claimed that a 2018 Facebook change that prioritized divisive posts led to higher user engagement.
This helped bosses to sell more online ads, which in turn has seen the social media giant’s valuation surpass $1 trillion.
“You force us to take positions we don’t like and that we know are harmful for society. We know that if these positions are not taken, we will lose in the social media marketplace,” Haugen stated.
She also blamed Facebook as the reason for the January 6 Capitol Riot.