Tech layoffs ravage the teams that fight online misinformation and hate speech
Summary
A Meta spokesperson did not respond to questions related to job cuts in specific areas and said in an emailed statement that "we remain focused on advancing our industry-leading integrity efforts and continue to invest in teams and technologies to protect our community." Across the tech industry, as companies tighten their belts and impose hefty layoffs to address macroeconomic pressures and slowing revenue growth, wide swaths of people tasked with protecting the internets most-populous playgrounds are being shown the exits. The person said the cuts caused a big hit to institutional knowledge, adding that there was a significant reduction in Twitchs law enforcement response team, which deals with physical threats, violence, terrorism groups and self-harm. Researchers from the Allen Institute for AI, Princeton University and Georgia Tech ran tests in ChatGPTs application programming interface (API), and found up to a sixfold increase in toxicity, depending on which type of functional identity, such as a customer service agent or virtual assistant, a company assigned to the chatbot. The company spent years hiring trust and safety workers, including many with academic backgrounds in the social sciences, to help avoid a repeat of the 2016 presidential election cycle, when disinformation campaigns, often operated by foreign actors, ran rampant on Facebook.