“Just not true” – Zuckerberg responds to claim Facebook put profits over safety

The boss of the world’s biggest social media giant has responded to claims made by a whistleblower stating they are ‘just not true’

Mark Zuckerberg has responded in a video to claims made by a former employee who blew the whistle on the social media company earlier this week, stating that Facebook puts profits before hate speech.

Zuckerberg posted a staunch defense of his company Facebook in a note to employees

He says recent claims by an ex-employee about the social network’s impacts on society “don’t make any sense.”

On Tuesday, a former Facebook product manager named Frances Haugen, testified before Congress about a trove of internal documents she gave to The Wall Street Journal.

She claimed that Facebook puts profits before doing anything about hate speech spread on its platform.

In the statement to staff, the Facebook boss stated that many of the claims “don’t make any sense”, pointing to their efforts in fighting harmful content, establishing transparency and creating “an industry-leading research program to under these important issues”.

Facebook is the world’s most popular social media site. The company says it has 2.7 billion monthly active users. Hundreds of millions of people also use the company’s other products, including WhatsApp and Instagram.

The platform though has been criticised for everything from failing to protect users’ privacy to not doing enough to halt the spread of disinformation.