Meta stops whistleblower from promoting memoir on Facebook, China after alleged NDA violations

A former Facebook director has been ordered to stop promoting and distributing copies of her new memoir that details allegations against the company following an emergency ruling won by Meta on Wednesday.

The book, Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism by Sarah Wynn-Williams, recounts her experience working for Meta as its global public policy director from 2011 to 2015. In the memoir, she detailed allegations that executives had collaborated with the Chinese government, exploring ways for Beijing to censor and control content "in exchange for access to the lucrative market," the BBC reported.

Meta refuted the allegations, saying that it has been "no secret" that the company was once interested in operating services in China. "We ultimately opted to not go through with the ideas we'd explored," said Meta.

The memoir also makes multiple allegations against former Meta COO Sheryl Sandberg. Wynn-Williams claims in the book that the former Meta COO once spent $13,000 on lingerie during a Europe trip and at one point told Wynn-Williams to to “come to bed” during a flight on a private jet, the New York Post reported.

Regarding the claims about Sandberg, a Meta spokesperson said, “This is a mix of out-of-date and previously reported claims about the company and false accusations about our executives.”

Meta filed complaint against Wynn-Williams in an effort to block its former director from promoting the book. Wynn-Williams was then ordered to refrain from engaging in or "amplifying any further disparaging, crucial or otherwise detrimental comments" at a hearing on Wednesday at the American Arbitration Association.

Nicholas Gowen, who arbitrated the hearing, found that Meta had provided efficient evidence to determine that Wynn-Williams potentially violated her severance contract. He issued the temporary ruling on grounds that Meta could suffer "immediate and irreparable loss."

Andy Stone, a spokesperson for Meta, praised the decision in a post on X, saying, "This ruling affirms that Sarah Wynn-Williams' false and defamatory book should never have been published."

Gowen did not order Flatiron Books, the book's publisher, to take any action. The memoir was released in the US on Tuesday and is near the top of the Amazon chart. It hit bookshelves in the UK on Thursday.

"As publishers, we are committed to upholding freedom of speech and her right to tell her story. Due to legal process instituted by Meta, the author has been prevented from continuing to participate in the book's publicity," a spokesperson for McMillan, the UK parent company of Flatiron Books, told the BBC.

Additionally, Wynn-Williams has also filed a whistleblower complaint with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), a market regulator, claiming that Meta has misled investors. Meta has denied this allegation.