As financial belt tightening and layoffs rippled throughout the tech industry in recent months, fact checkers and researchers who were tasked with keeping disinformation and extremism off of social media platforms are becoming scarce, CNBC reported.
"The cuts come at a time of increased cyberbullying, which has been linked to higher rates of adolescent self-harm, and as the spread of misinformation and violent content collides with the exploding use of artificial intelligence," the report stated.
In a mass effort to boost productivity with less overhead, Meta, Alphabet, Amazon, and Microsoft have all slashed thousands of jobs.
In an example of just how far tech companies are willing to go to cut costs, departments tasked with trust and safety and AI ethics have been slashed as well.
"Twitter effectively disbanded its ethical AI team in November and laid off all but one of its members, along with 15% of its trust and safety department, according to reports. In February, Google cut about one-third of a unit that aims to protect society from misinformation, radicalization, toxicity and censorship," says CNBC. "Meta reportedly ended the contracts of about 200 content moderators in early January. It also laid off at least 16 members of Instagram’s well-being group and more than 100 positions related to trust, integrity and responsibility, according to documents filed with the U.S. Department of Labor."
Read the full report over at CNBC News.
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