Meta takes legal action to block ex-employee’s memoir that reveals shocking details about company

Meta

Meta is trying to stop the promotion of a tell-all memoir by a former employee that paints the company in a negative light. The memoir reportedly includes allegations of sexual harassment against one of its top executives, according to NBC News.

Sarah Wynn-Williams, who worked at Facebook (now Meta) from 2011 to 2017, released her book Careless People earlier this week. The memoir details her time at the company, including her interactions with CEO Mark Zuckerberg, former COO Sheryl Sandberg, and Joel Kaplan, Meta’s current policy chief. In the book, she claims Kaplan made inappropriate comments to her, which she reported as sexual harassment.

Meta is pushing back hard. The company took emergency legal action, arguing that Wynn-Williams violated a non-disparagement agreement she signed when she left in 2017.

An emergency arbitrator sided with Meta, statig that she must stop promoting the book, take back negative statements, and avoid making further “disparaging” remarks about the company or its executives.

Meta spokesperson Andy Stone called the book “false and defamatory” and said it should never have been published. He also accused Wynn-Williams of deliberately hiding the project and skipping the usual fact-checking process to rush the book to shelves.

Wynn-Williams has also accused Meta of attempting to build censorship tools to gain access to the Chinese market. She claims she was included in a whistleblower complaint to U.S. regulators.

The emergency ruling follows a legal battle where Wynn-Williams did not appear for a hearing, despite being notified. So far, neither she nor her publishers—Flatiron Books and Macmillan—have responded to the ruling.