'Facebook Papers' Reveal Extent Of Platform's Abuse, Employee Frustration With Executives' Inaction

The "Facebook Papers" have put the world’s largest social media platform in a corner, hit from all sides with accusations of neglect, incompetence and greed. The revelations show just how much Facebook knew about the ways its platform was being abused, and the frustration employees felt over their inability to stop it.

The project began with a series of document leaks to the Wall Street Journal in September. This led to an expose on how Facebook was aware of the harmful impact Instagram, which it owns, has on the mental health of teenage girls.

Soon after, the whistleblower outed herself as Frances Haugen in an interview with CBS's "60 Minutes," followed by a scathing hearing before a U.S. Senate subcommittee that shined the spotlight on Facebook's missteps.

Since then, the Facebok Papers have documented how the platform was being misused for spreading dangerous misinformation, fanning the flames of ethnic violence, and for organized crime.

A common theme that has emerged in all of these instances has been a clash between employees witnessing the abuse unfold before them and an executive team that is portrayed as disinclined to take action.

In the documents shared with journalists, employees pinpointed ways that bad actors were misusing either Facebook or Instagram and requested more power to cut them off. However, higher ups were frequently slow to enact new policies and in other cases watered them down.

“How are we expected to ignore when leadership overrides research based policy decisions to better serve people like the groups inciting violence today,” one employee asked on a Jan. 6 message board, in one illustrative example reported on by Politico.

Facebook has defended itself from critics by pointing to the tools and systems it has put in place to address concerns about violence, crimes or misinformation on its platform. Despite these changes, Facebook's own oversight panel has flagged failings in several of these systems and faulted executives for being less than forthcoming with the body.

It has also accused journalists reporting on the Facebook Papers as curating only the most damaging allegations from the troves of documents in its possession.

"A curated selection out of millions of documents at Facebook can in no way be used to draw fair conclusions about us," John Pinette, Vice President of Facebook Communications, said in a tweet last week. "To those news organizations who would like to move beyond an orchestrated ‘gotcha’ campaign, we are ready to engage on the substance."

The company has not specified why it has not released copies of research that would disprove the allegations made against it, but insisted it is looking for a way to do so.

It does not appear that Facebook is in any way headed towards a break-up, something Haugen, the whistleblower, said would not do much to remedy the situation. Instead, the maelstrom of crises may be pushing it closer to a rebranding than a larger overhaul.

Facebook is reportedly considering a name change in the near future. However, it would not provide the internal policy changes that would see concerns employees are highlighting in advance acted on sooner, ideally before a future leak occurs.