Facebook
Criticisms and controversies

"I'm here today because I believe Facebook's products harm children, stoke division, and weaken our democracy. The company's leadership knows how to make Facebook and Instagram safer, but won't make the necessary changes because they have put their astronomical profits before people."

— Frances Haugen, condemning lack of transparency around Facebook at a US congressional hearing (2021).

"I don't believe private companies should make all of the decisions on their own. That's why we have advocated for updated internet regulations for several years now. I have testified in Congress multiple times and asked them to update these regulations. I've written op-eds outlining the areas of regulation we think are most important related to elections, harmful content, privacy, and competition."

—Mark Zuckerberg, responding to Frances Haugen 's revelations (2021).

Facebook's importance and scale has led to criticisms in many domains. Issues include Internet privacy, excessive retention of user information, its facial recognition software, DeepFace its addictive quality and its role in the workplace, including employer access to employee accounts.

Facebook has been criticized for electricity usage, tax avoidance, real-name user requirement policies, censorship and its involvement in the United States PRISM surveillance program. According to The Express Tribune, Facebook "avoided billions of dollars in tax using offshore companies".

Facebook is alleged to have harmful psychological effects on its users, including feelings of jealousy and stress, a lack of attention and social media addiction. According to Kaufmann et al., mothers' motivations for using social media are often related to their social and mental health. European antitrust regulator Margrethe Vestager stated that Facebook's terms of service relating to private data were "unbalanced".

Facebook has been criticized for allowing users to publish illegal or offensive material. Specifics include copyright and intellectual property infringement, hate speech, incitement of rape and terrorism, fake news, and crimes, murders, and livestreaming violent incidents. Commentators have accused Facebook of willingly facilitating the spread of such content. Sri Lanka blocked both Facebook and WhatsApp in May 2019 after anti-Muslim riots, the worst in the country since the Easter Sunday bombing in the same year as a temporary measure to maintain peace in Sri Lanka. Facebook removed 3 billion fake accounts only during the last quarter of 2018 and the first quarter of 2019; in comparison, the social network reports 2.39 billion monthly active users.

In late July 2019, the company announced it was under antitrust investigation by the Federal Trade Commission.

The consumer advocacy group, Which?, claims that individuals are still utilizing Facebook to set up fraudulent five-star ratings for various products. The group has identified 14 communities that exchange reviews for either money or complimentary items such as watches, earbuds, and sprinklers.
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