Mark Zuckerberg found himself under intense scrutiny in Washington D.C. this week, battling on two separate fronts. As he began testifying on April 14th in a major Federal Trade Commission antitrust trial threatening to break up Meta, damaging allegations from a former employee regarding the company’s dealings in China, made just days earlier in a Senate hearing room, cast a long shadow.
Former Facebook public policy director Sarah Wynn-Williams accused the Meta CEO of personally driving the development of censorship technology for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and subsequently misrepresenting these efforts to Congress.
Testifying before the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Counterterrorism, chaired by Republican Senator Josh Hawley, on April 9th, Wynn-Williams painted a picture of a company prioritizing access to the Chinese market above all else. “I witnessed Meta work hand in glove with the Chinese Communist Party to construct and test custom-built censorship tools that silenced and censored their critics,” she stated, adding, “When Beijing demanded that Facebook delete the account of a prominent Chinese dissident living on American soil, they did it, and then lied to Congress when asked about the incident in a Senate hearing.”
Wynn-Williams claimed internal security staff explicitly warned management about the project potentially exposing American user data to Chinese state surveillance. “They documented their concern in a number of ways,” Wynn-Williams testified, recounting engineers lamenting that their own ethical boundaries differed from the CEO’s: “’My red line as a security engineer is to not be comfortable with this, but my red line is not Mark Zuckerberg’s red line.’”
When asked if Zuckerberg had any red line regarding these risks, Wynn-Williams responded, “I did not.” Wynn-Williams’s departure from Meta in 2017 was attributed by the company to “poor performance,” though she reportedly points to disagreements over the China strategy, and Meta has allegedly threatened her over violating a non-disparagement agreement.
Inside The Alleged China Censorship Project
Wynn-Williams, whose recent book “Careless People” Meta reportedly sought to suppress in the US, details how Zuckerberg allegedly oversaw the creation of censorship tools specifically for the CCP. “Nothing happened here without his approval and knowledge,” she asserted, emphasizing his personal investment through learning Mandarin and frequent travel to China. She claimed these tools were developed over a four-year period of direct dialogue with the CCP and were tested by Chinese officials who provided iterative feedback. This aligns with older reports from around 2016 suggesting Facebook was exploring such tools, though Meta stated then they weren’t implemented.
Key components allegedly included “virality counters” that flagged posts hitting 10,000 views for manual review by a “chief editor,” a role Senator Blumenthal characterized during the hearing as an “Orwellian censor” based on her testimony. Crucially, she alleged this system wasn’t confined to mainland China. The virality counters and the chief editor’s extensive powers – including shutting down service regionally (like in Xinjiang) or during sensitive anniversaries like Tiananmen Square – were reportedly planned for and activated in Hong Kong and Taiwan. The testimony also included the specific claim that Facebook deleted the account of US-based dissident Guo Wengui in 2017 following pressure from Beijing (Meta’s stated reason at the time was Guo sharing personal info), later denying the incident to Congress.
Wynn-Williams further alleged Meta shared sensitive AI models – specifically claiming the company’s open-source Llama large language model was used to help Chinese competitor DeepSeek – and pursued infrastructure projects like the Pacific Light Cable Network, a proposed ultra-high-capacity undersea data cable connecting the US, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and the Philippines, despite warnings about potential CCP backdoor access risks. She claimed only Congressional intervention halted the project involving Hong Kong.
Contradicting The Record
The core of the whistleblower’s accusation centers on Zuckerberg’s 2018 appearance before the Senate. While that April 2018 testimony primarily addressed the Cambridge Analytica scandal, Wynn-Williams claims that when asked about potential cooperation with Chinese censorship, Zuckerberg stated Facebook was blocked in China and thus couldn’t know how the government would apply its regulations if access were granted. Wynn-Williams labeled this specific assertion “not accurate,” insisting that by 2018, Meta had already built, tested (with CCP input), and turned on the bespoke censorship apparatus. The direct denial of these tools’ existence to Congress, while allegedly collaborating with the CCP, forms the crux of her claim.
Following the April 9th hearing, Subcommittee Chair Senator Josh Hawley formally requested Zuckerberg appear before the panel to address the allegations.
Meta Pushes Back Amid Broader Battles
Meta forcefully contested the whistleblower’s account. In statements to media outlets like the Associated Press concurrent with the antitrust trial’s start, the company called Wynn-Williams’s testimony “divorced from reality and riddled with false claims.” A spokesperson reiterated that while Zuckerberg’s interest in China was public knowledge years ago, “the fact is this: we do not operate our services in China today.” This denial highlights a starkly different narrative from the one Meta presented in its defense against the FTC.
In the antitrust courtroom, where proceedings began April 14th, Meta’s lawyers argued the company faces vigorous competition, specifically citing “Chinese-owned TikTok” as a rival. A company blog post expanded on this, stating, “`Regulators should be supporting American innovation, rather than seeking to break up a great American company and further advantaging China on critical issues like AI.`” Wynn-Williams offered a sharp retort to this line of argument in her Senate testimony: “The greatest trick Mark Zuckerberg ever pulled was wrapping the American flag around himself and calling himself a patriot, saying he didn’t offer services in China, while he spent the last decade building an $18 billion business there,” accusing him of sharing tech that aided Chinese surveillance.
The FTC trial itself, stemming from the Instagram and WhatsApp acquisitions, proceeded after Zuckerberg’s personal attempts to settle the case in late March failed. His initial $450 million offer was reportedly called “`delusional`” by former FTC Chair Lina Khan, and subsequent offers still fell far short of the agency’s multi-billion dollar demands, according to reporting by the Wall Street Journal.
