Over in his £7million mansion outside San Francisco, Sir Nick Clegg must have been choking on his morning kale smoothie.
Facebook’s richly rewarded ‘Vice President of Global Affairs and Communications’ was in for a busy old day: One that would surely feature crisis meetings, emails marked ‘urgent’ and the odd eardrum-bashing from his boss, company founder Mark Zuckerberg (37 years old and with a net worth of over $121billion).
In Westminster Facebook employee-turned-whistleblower Frances Haugen was in the House of Commons spilling the borlotti on her ex-employer.
Or, even more importantly, to up-end a giant bucket full of pig slurry all around its head.

Frances Haugen, a Facebook whistleblower, has left the Houses of Parliament in London after she testified before MPs and peers about government plans to regulate social media.
Miss Haugen is a one-time Facebook data scientist who earlier this year shared thousands of pages of company documents outlining the firm’s failure to keep toxic content off its platforms.
She had been invited to give evidence to Parliament’s Joint Committee to advise on the Online Harms Bill, which Parliament hopes to hurry into the statute book following the shocking murder of Sir David Amess earlier this month.
Over the course of a jargon-filled two-and-a-half hours, we heard how Facebook had evolved from modest origins in Zuckerberg’s Harvard dorm room into a swirling cesspit where vile harmful content not only flourishes like toadstools on a rotting log, but is in fact prioritised.
‘Anger and hate [are] the easiest way to grow Facebook,’ she told the committee matter-of-factly. Oh, Cleggy! How did this beacon of self-righteous morality get involved with such a shameless bunch of wrong ‘uns?

Over in his £7million mansion outside San Francisco, Sir Nick Clegg must have been choking on his morning kale smoothie
Perhaps his reported £2.7million salary helped to sway him. Haugen was great.
Whistleblowers can often come across as disgruntled employees or, worse, as people who are looking for fame, book deals, appearances on documentaries, and so forth.
She was still credible and reliable, despite her tendency to indulge in corporate gobbledegook.
She spoke incessantly and without prompting. Her answers were illustrated by energetic arm gestures.
Behind her sat a group of men, who occasionally took notes. Based on their large wristwatches, I believe they are corporate lawyers.
Early questioning from committee chairman Damian Collins (Con, Folkestone) concerned Facebook’s chat groups, a popular meeting place for conspiracy-theory cranks to peddle their codswallop.
Unless rapid action was taken, recent violence such as the storming of Washington’s Capitol Hill in January were just the ‘opening chapters’, Haugen predicted.
She blamed Facebook’s lack of online ‘safety officers’. She claimed that when she saw something that might pose a threat for national security, she didn’t know who to report it too.
Another problem, she claimed, was that Zuckerberg’s cohorts still behaved as though they were working at a start up.
She repeatedly referred to the notorious hoodie-sporting oddball as ‘Mark’, suggesting a close familiarity.
Soon Labour peer Lord Knight was getting involved. His Lordship called in remotely without a jacket nor tie. He was trying to look like another Palo Alto tech guy.

Another problem, she claimed, was Zuckerberg’s behavior and that of his cohorts, who behaved as if they were working for a start up. She repeatedly referred to the notorious hoodie-sporting oddball as ‘Mark’, suggesting a close familiarity
We learned that Facebook charged considerably less for the most divisive adverts than for compassionate ones, because the former got more ‘engagement’ from users.
The platform was ‘subsidising hate,’ said Haugen. There was a collective pious shaking and shaking of heads around the U-shaped table.
Haugen was clearly considered a hero by this committee. The deference was reciprocated. ‘Great question!’ she would remark occasionally in her hokey Midwestern accent.
John Nicolson (SNP Ochil) popped up. ‘You’re trending on Twitter!’ he informed Haugen over-excitedly.
He wanted to talk about Instagram. The Facebook-owned photo platform is accused of giving young girls body problems.
Although users are supposed to be 13 in order to join, Haugen claimed that Facebook did little to enforce this rule.

In Westminster Facebook employee-turned-whistleblower Frances Haugen was in the House of Commons spilling the borlotti on her ex-employer
The earlier young people are using the platform, the ‘earlier they get them hooked,’ she shrugged.
Mr. Nicolson was chasing a headline. ‘Is Facebook evil?’ he asked.
Haugen replied cryptically that it was not for her to ‘see into the hearts of men’. Nicolson tried again.
‘Is it malevolent?’ Same thing, surely – and still no dice.
A question was raised towards the end about whether Zuck would lose sleep over the proposed Online Harms Bill.
Haugen bit her lip and suggested he would be ‘paying attention to what you’re doing’. In other words, it was straightforward.
Perhaps Cleggy can rest easy – though how he squares working for such a company with his own ‘liberal, democratic’ principles is anyone’s guess.