Activists urge Facebook workers to expose internal discussions on free speech

Facebook employees are being urged to speak up about their employer in the face of the 2020 presidential election. In order to preserve election integrity, Mark Zuckerberg's employees are being implored to come forth with information about the "the enforcement decisions that endanger free and fair elections" as they are able to see "how the company is choosing to respond, or not respond, to disinformation and calls to violence."

The call to essentially snitch on Facebook comes from the nonpartisan digital rights group known as Free Press. The group says that if the employees speak up right now through anonymous and confidential routes, they could save the United States from worse political instability.

Be a whistleblower — According to Free Press, Facebook employees can become a whistleblower against their company by filing an anonymous complaint with the New York Attorney General. In order to do this, a Facebook employee will have to download the Tor browser to ensure communications privacy and encryption. Then they'll have to go to the address: http://nyattgennttw5c3d.onion.

In the whistleblower complaint, the employee will have to describe the information they have on hand, the nature of their complaint, relevant files, and their own contact information, if they choose to. After that, the employee receives a secret code.

This could work — The likelihood of Facebook employees speaking up about internal operations and their social repercussions is pretty high. In September, BuzzFeed News reported about a Facebook employee who refused severance to bring public attention to Facebook's role in global and political manipulation. The employee said, "I have blood on my hands." Detailed in the explosive report were incidents about "blatant attempts by foreign national governments to abuse our platform on vast scales to mislead their own citizenry, and caused international news on multiple occasions," according to the former Facebook worker.

The call to snitch comes just days after Facebook (finally) attempted to crack down on conspiracy movements like the far-right and violent QAnon. The official response from the company has been paltry and delayed, as critics have repeatedly noticed. It wouldn't be shocking to find out that there is even more tension behind the scenes. If a Facebook employee or two comes forward with internal and confidential details for Free Press, they might be able to equip the American public with critical information around the network's strategy for the upcoming election, misinformation, false advertisements, and much more.