Facebook whistleblowers allege government and emergency services hit by Australia news ban was a deliberate tactic

Meta, the company formerly known as Facebook, has strenuously denied the claims.

US-based legal organisation Whistleblower Aid said on Friday it had filed a disclosure with the US Department of Justice and the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) on behalf of former Facebook employees alleging that Facebook had deliberately over-blocked pages as a means of negotiating a better outcome in the negotiations over legislation to force Meta to pay Australian media companies for news content.

The allegations were first reported by the Wall Street Journal. Whistleblower Aid also represented Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen.

On 17 February, 2021, Facebook blocked all news on its platform in Australia, including information, government, health and emergency services pages such as Department of Fire and Emergency Services, the Council on Homeless Persons, the Australian Medical Association, the Sydney Local Health District, Suicide Prevention Australia, the Tasmanian Government, SA Health, Fire and Rescue New South Wales and, 1800Respect.

Facebook at the time was claiming the legislation would create an unworkable precedent, but said the blocking of government pages was inadvertent.

The action forced the federal government back to the negotiating table, and reached a compromise in the legislation stating that Facebook and Google would not be designated as platforms covered by the code if the companies could demonstrate they had successfully negotiated payment deals with media companies in Australia.

A Meta spokesperson denied the blocking of Australian government pages was deliberate.

The pages were restored on 22 February 2021, with the remainder coming back online after the legislation passed.

To date since the legislation passed, both companies have not been designated under the code, after dozens of deals were negotiated with local media companies, including Guardian Australia.

The whistleblowers also allege that Facebook did not follow the standard process to prevent over-blocking before the action, such as using lists of sensitive accounts not to block, and there was no formal appeals process.

The Australian communications minister, Paul Fletcher, said the legislation was working as intended, and had kicked off moves for similar legislation in other parts of the world.

The ACCC confirmed it had received the whistleblower documents.