Former Fb govt Sarah Wynn-Williams accused the social media firm of undermining nationwide safety and briefing China on U.S. AI efforts with a purpose to develop its enterprise there.
Wynn-Williams, who was fired as Fb’s director of world coverage in 2017, spoke earlier than the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday.
‘We’re engaged in a high-stakes AI arms race in opposition to China. And through my time at Meta, firm executives lied about what they have been doing with the Chinese language Communist Social gathering to workers, shareholders, Congress, and the American public,’ Wynn-Williams stated in her ready testimony.
Her e-book ‘Careless Individuals,’ an explosive insider account of her time on the social media large, bought 60,000 copies in its first week and reached the highest 10 on Amazon´s best-seller record.
The tech large two weeks in the past gained an emergency ruling to briefly cease Wynn-Williams from selling or additional distributing copies of her memoir, invoking the phrases of her eight-year-old separation settlement whereas doing so.
Meta used a ‘marketing campaign of threats and intimidation’ to silence the previous govt, stated Sen. Richard Blumenthal, a Democrat from Connecticut, through the listening to.
Wynn-Williams served as director of world public coverage at Fb, now Meta, from 2011 till she was fired in 2017.
‘All through these seven years, I noticed Meta executives repeatedly undermine U.S. nationwide safety and betray American values. They did these items in secret to win favor with Beijing and construct an 18 billion greenback enterprise in China,’ she stated.
Sarah Wynn-Williams, Fb’s former director of International Public Coverage, is sworn in to testify earlier than the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Counterterrorism on Capitol Hill, Wednesday, April 9, 2025, in Washington. (AP Picture/Mark Schiefelbein)
Meta and Mark Zuckerberg (pictured proper) used a ‘marketing campaign of threats and intimidation’ to silence the previous govt
Wynn-Williams additionally stated Meta deleted the Fb account of a outstanding Chinese language dissident residing within the U.S., bowing to strain from China to take action.
Meta says that account, belonging to billionaire Guo Wengui, shared personally identifiable info akin to folks’s passport numbers, social safety numbers, nationwide ID numbers and residential addresses and was eliminated as a result of this violated Fb’s guidelines.
And she or he stated Meta ‘ignored warnings’ that constructing a ‘bodily pipeline’ between the U.S. and China would offer China with backdoor entry to U.S. consumer information.
These plans – referred to as the Pacific Mild Cable Community – by no means materialized, however Wynn-Williams stated that was solely as a result of lawmakers stepped in.
In an announcement, Meta stated Wynn-Williams´ testimony ‘is divorced from actuality and riddled with false claims.
Whereas Mark Zuckerberg himself was public about our curiosity in providing our companies in China and particulars have been broadly reported starting over a decade in the past, the very fact is that this: we don’t function our companies in China in the present day.’
Zuckerberg, together with different Large Tech executives, have been making an attempt to enhance their standing with President Donald Trump’s administration in current months – by way of visits to Mar-a-Lago and the White Home, in addition to financial donations – it’s not but clear if the efforts are paying off.
‘This can be a man who wears many alternative costumes,’ Wynn-Williams stated of Zuckerberg.
‘We’re engaged in a high-stakes AI arms race in opposition to China. And through my time at Meta, firm executives lied about what they have been doing with the Chinese language Communist Social gathering to workers, shareholders, Congress, and the American public,’ Wynn-Williams stated in her ready testimony. Pictured: Chinese language President Xi Jinping
Sarah Wynn-Williams, Fb’s former director of International Public Coverage, testifies earlier than the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Counterterrorism on Capitol Hill, Wednesday, April 9
‘Once I was there, he wished the president of China to call his first youngster, he was studying Mandarin, he was censoring to his coronary heart’s content material. Now his new costume is MMA combating or… free speech. We don’t know what the following costume is gonna be, however it will likely be one thing completely different. It’s no matter will get him closest to energy.’
The listening to comes simply days earlier than Meta´s huge antitrust trial is scheduled to start.
The Federal Commerce Fee´s case in opposition to the tech large might pressure the corporate to divest Instagram and WhatsApp.
Her testimony comes weeks after a report from the Washington Submit exhibits how PRs for Zuckerberg and his cronies went into overdrive behind the scenes to attempt to discredit Wynn-Williams, who was fired as Fb’s director of world coverage in 2017.
Regardless of all this, the 400-page ‘Careless Individuals: A Cautionary Story of Energy, Greed, and Misplaced Idealism’ made its option to the No. 3 spot on Amazon bestsellers record this week.
The publish report, in the meantime, consists of a number of alleged accounts surrounding prime Mark Zuckerberg lieutenants like former Fb COO Sheryl Sandberg, a few of which have been salacious.
She alleges leaders like Sandberg engaged in open sexual harassment, whereas brass willingly turned a blind eye. Sandberg stepped down as Meta’s COO in June 2022, and can depart Meta’s board in Could. Her exit is claimed to not be associated to Wynn-Williams.
Public relations staffers and execs at Meta have ‘been working in overdrive the previous two weeks’ since, the Submit notes – citing particular makes an attempt to discredit Wynn-Williams forward the e-book’s launch.
Her testimony comes weeks after a report from the Washington Submit exhibits how PRs for Zuckerberg and his cronies went into overdrive behind the scenes to attempt to discredit Wynn-Williams, who was fired as Fb’s director of world coverage in 2017
Wynn-Williams additional claimed Meta makes use of adverts focused towards teenagers based mostly on their emotional state – and is happy with doing so. She additionally advised that her 2017 firing – formally for ‘poor efficiency and poisonous habits’ – was retaliatory, after she raised considerations
Other than the lawsuit, this included adverse statements in regards to the writer despatched to reporters prematurely of publication, the Submit reported.
Meta has denied an excessive amount of the claims.
On March 7, Meta spokeswoman Erin Logan despatched Steven Levy, a veteran journalist for the tech information web site Wired, a preemptive warning in regards to the soon-to-be-released e-book, the Submit revealed.
The warning was made earlier than anybody at Meta had even seen the e-book, however Logan nonetheless reiterated to Levy in an e-mail that Wynn-Williams had been fired and had beforehand made ‘false claims.’
Particulars of these supposed false claims weren’t shared.
Logan’s makes an attempt to discredit Wynn-Williams a solely piqued Levy’s curiosity, Logan instructed the Submit in an interview.
Meta additionally dispatched present and former workers to query the veracity of the claims in Wynn-Williams’ e-book, whereas trying to downplay a number of the extra severe allegations.
This included allegations that Sandberg as soon as made the writer’s assistant purchase $13,000 price of lingerie for the 2 throughout a steamy Italian work journey, amid what Wynn-Williams offered as an inappropriate, overbearing relationship.
Meta tried to bury a former staffer’s tell-all about her six years at Fb this 12 months – and a brand new report claims to have revealed how. The Washington Submit piece surrounded Wynn-Williams, who was fired from her publish as the corporate’s director of world coverage in 2017
It consists of a number of alleged accounts surrounding prime Zuckerberg lieutenants like former Fb COO Sheryl Sandberg (seen with the Fb CEO in 2021), who the writer says sexually harassed her and her then assistant
It noticed Sandberg and the younger, 26-year-old assistant – named solely as Sadie – take turns sleeping in one another’s laps and stroking one another’s hair throughout a prolonged drive by way of Europe, in line with Wynn-Williams.
Furthermore, throughout a personal jet flight again to the States, a pouty Sandberg allegedly instructed Wynn-Williams herself to ‘come to mattress’ (the only real one on the plane) – all whereas treating her assistant as a kind of ‘little doll’ or ‘lady-in-waiting.’
The memoir additional claims Sandberg grew to become visibly aggravated when Wynn-Williams rejected her invitation to affix her in mattress, at a time when the writer was additionally visibly pregnant.
‘Sadie’s slept over a number of instances and I’m not asking Sadie. I’m asking you,’ she supposedly stated.
The alleged hair-petting, lap-sitting, and propositioning was not all, although – because the Submit report realized Meta staffers flooded retailers with constructive feedback in regards to the firm from different workers to outweigh these from Wynn-Williams.
Additionally named was then vp of Fb’s world coverage Joel Kaplan, who, on the time, was Wynn-Williams’ boss.
A conservative operative with ties to Republican politics, Kaplan as soon as instructed Wynn-Williams she seemed ‘sultry’ and pressed in opposition to her on the dance ground at a piece occasion, Wynn-Williams claimed.
When the writer was on maternity depart and nonetheless bleeding from surgical procedure, Kaplan allegedly continued to name her, it’s claimed.
He even allegedly requested the place she had been bleeding from.
Wynn-Williams went on to report Kaplan for sexual harassment, leaving Meta to conduct what it later put as prolonged investigation, which included interviews with 17 witness and ended with Kaplan being cleared.
CEO Zuckerberg, in the meantime, was portrayed as a coder-turned-megalomaniac – one more and more obsessive about politics and his personal public picture.
He, Sandberg, and Kaplan have been collectively categorized as ‘careless’ – with the title itself being a reference to F Scott Fitzgerald’s The Nice Gatsby, whose well-heeled solid of characters are stated to ‘smash up issues… after which retreat again into their cash’.
The dynamic, Wynn-Williams stated, was seen from her previous bosses – lots of whom she claimed willingly turned a blind eye to the methods its platforms might hurt customers world wide.
This included enabling human rights violations in Asia and granting China surveillance energy over Fb customers, she wrote – describing exec ‘offering briefings to CCP officers on new applied sciences like synthetic intelligence, growing bespoke censorship instruments with the CCP, and making efforts to cover Meta’s cooperation with the CCP from america Congress.’
Wynn-Williams additional claimed Meta makes use of adverts focused towards teenagers based mostly on their emotional state – and says the social media platform is happy with doing so.
She additionally advised that her 2017 firing – formally for ‘poor efficiency and poisonous habits’ – was retaliatory, after she raised considerations about Kaplan.
In an announcement, Meta slammed these claims, saying it incorporates ‘a mixture of out-of-date and beforehand reported claims in regards to the firm and false accusations about our executives.’
An organization additional stated Wynn-Williams ‘has been paid by anti-Fb activists’, because the Submit report claimed to supply new gentle on Zuckerberg’s response to current leaks about his administration model within the type of extra quotes relayed by insiders’.
‘The whole lot I say leaks.
‘And so it sucks, proper?” Zuckerberg stated throughout an organization assembly referred to as in January after it introduced would now not assist unbiased fact-checking on its websites,
A month later, the corporate introduced it had fired ‘roughly 20 workers’ – for ‘sharing confidential info exterior the corporate,’ the Submit reported.
