Facebook parent company Meta actively sought to assist China gain a competitive edge in the ongoing global AI race to win favor with Beijing, a whistleblower has made a congressional committee.
Sarah Wynn-Williams, who served as Global Public Policy at Facebook between 2011 and 2017, appeared before the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Counterterrorism.
She also wrote a blistering memoir titled “Careless People,” in which she slammed Meta executives for colluding with China. When it was published, Wynn-Williams’s book quickly rose to Amazon’s top 10 bestsellers.
Appearing at the congressional hearing, she detailed how Meta executives, including the company’s CEO and founder Mark Zuckerberg, repeatedly undermined the national security of the United States and American values to build an “$18 billion business in China.”
“We are engaged in a high-stakes AI arms race against China, and during my time at Meta, company executives lied about what they were doing with the Chinese Communist Party to employees, shareholders, Congress, and the American public,” Wynn-Williams said.
The whistleblower said Facebook helped China quickly advance in AI technologies like DeepSeek, which has emerged as one of the top AI models, threatening U.S. AI giants such as OpenAI. It also has the capacity for political and military applications.
Additionally, she also accused the social media giant of deleting a Facebook account of a Chinese dissident, Guo Wengui, living in the United States, due to pressure from Beijing. The company allegedly “lied under oath” that Wengui’s account was terminated according to the company’s normal policies.
The Facebook whistleblower also claimed that Meta was briefing the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) as early as 2015, suggesting active communication.
“These briefings focused on critical emerging technologies, including artificial intelligence. The explicit goal being to help China outcompete American companies.”
The alleged briefings occurred at every level, including at the company’s top leadership.
Other allegations from Wynn-Williams’ testimony include Facebook being willing to hand over Chinese and Hong Kongese user data to Beijing and create point-of-presence (PoP) servers in China, essentially handing over American users’ data.
Similarly, Facebook developed a censorship tool dubbed “Chief Editor” to review Chinese posts with over 10,000 views, and Meta’s AI technology was allegedly being used for Chinese military purposes.
The probe into the alleged Facebook collusion with China has received wide bipartisan support from both Republican and Democratic lawmakers.
The Subcommittee chair, U.S. Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO), has demanded that Zuckerberg testify under oath to clarify the issue.
“The public deserves to hear your response to these serious allegations, particularly since they pertain to American national security,” Sen. Hawley wrote.
Ranking Senate Judiciary Committee member U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) also put the company in the spotlight for denying the “Chief Editor” censorship tool for China.
“So, the chief editor, a creation of Facebook, was an Orwellian censor that apply to locations outside of mainland China to Taiwan and Hong Kong… Even though its very existence was denied before this Committee in 2018,” he noted.
Facebook continues to deny the allegations and discredit her work, saying its work in China was widely reported and it no longer operates in the country.
While Facebook remains banned in China, Wynn-Williams pointed to various corporate filings reporting billions earned from advertising in the country. Handing over data and cooperating with the government may also not necessarily require the user platform to be accessible in the country.
Nonetheless, Facebook insists that her allegations were “divorced from reality and riddled with false claims.” The social media giant also seeks $50,000 in damages for every allegation that Wynn-Williams has made.
Meanwhile, the fate of the Chinese-owned social media giant TikTok remains on balance as the Trump administration considers whether to proceed with the proposed ban or allow American companies to buy it. Microsoft has floated an offer to buy ByteDance-owned TikTok for $30 billion. Amazon and Oracle have also shown interest in acquiring the video-sharing social media platform.
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This clarifies a lot of my confusion on the topic.