Facebook’s content moderators in Austin are claiming that the outsourcing company that employs them has repeatedly tried to violate the confidentiality of the therapy sessions used to help them cope with the horrible videos, images and text that they screen out for the social media giant.
According to a report by The Intercept, the moderators are employed by outsourcing company Accenture and work within a specially-designated section in the Facebook Austin campus, but they lack the same sorts of benefits and care that come with being an actual Facebook staffer.
The content moderators, who work across Facebook and Instagram, are said to be required to view up to 800 pieces of graphic content per shift, leaving them to rely on the counselors on site to help them contend with the trauma resulting from the constant barrage of graphic images and words they are tasked with reviewing.
Outsourced content moderators working for Facebook have claimed that managers attempted to pressure on-site counselors into revealing confidential information from therapy sessions
The content moderators use the on-site counselors to help them mentally process the graphic and horrific media they are tasked with reviewing on a daily basis (stock image)
Workers said that included among the content they are reviewing is graphic violence, sexual abuse, child abuse, animal abuse, porn and self-mutilation.
Sources told the news site that hundreds of moderators could be asked to share one counselor at a time and that their access to these counseling sessions had been reduced over time and sometimes even restricted unless ‘their productivity was high enough for that day.’
In the past, the sources said moderators were allowed on 45 minutes a week with a counselor or two hours a day if they were tasked with reviewing images and footage of child sexual abuse. At the bare minimum, they said they had a quota of one session per quarter.
About 12 of these Austin-based moderators are said to have written a letter that is now circulating among the employees, revealing the fact that Accenture managers allegedly tried to pressure the on-site, licensed counselors — known as ‘wellness coaches’ — into telling them what they and the employees talked about during their sessions.
Although The Intercept said that it was unclear what exact information these Accenture managers were hoping to find out, both counselors and the employees were under the impression that the sessions were meant to be confidential.
The letter revealed a specific example that occurred when a counselor was approached by a manager and asked to share what was spoken about during one of the moderator’s counseling sessions.
The content moderators work out of a special area set aside for outsourced workers (pictured) within the Facebook Austin corporate offices
Facebook corporate conducted a review of the moderators’ claims and determined that there was ‘no violation or breach of trust’ between the counselors and the content moderators
The content moderators are hired by Accenture, which has been accused of trying to pressure counselors to reveal information from moderators’ counseling sessions, potentially for use in firing the moderators, according to the workers’ letter
The outsourced workers may work at Facebook Austin’s offices (pictured), but they don’t have access to the same sort of benefits or care that staffers have
According to the letter, which was obtained by The Intercept, the counselor refused, ‘stating confidentiality concerns,’ but the Accenture manager ‘pressed on by stating that because this was not a clinical setting, confidentiality did not exist.’
The letter writers noted that: ‘This pressuring of a licensed counselor to divulge confidential information is at best a careless breach of trust into the Wellness program and, at worst, an ethics and possible legal violation.’
Sources told the news site that the counselor ended up quitting over the incident.
The letter writers claimed that the sessions were confidential because the counselors were licensed and thus ‘required to keep confidentiality in their personal practices,’ meaning that ‘there is an expectation of privacy prior to engagement.’
For there to be no confidentiality, they claimed, those seeking counseling would need to sign a HIPAA waiver prior to the sessions taking place.
‘Neither Facebook, Accenture, nor WeCare can remove confidentiality post facto from any previous session,’ the letter stated.
The Intercept reported that a lawyer with Wachler & Associates, which specializes in health care law and HIPAA compliance, said that the incident detailed in the letter was unlikely to be considered an actual HIPAA violation, however.
Because the alleged pressuring of counselors to reveal supposedly confidential information occurred on more than one occasion, the employees wrote that ‘This is no longer an isolated incident but a systemic top-down problem plaguing Accenture management.’
Unless the situation was ‘be addressed as soon as possible,’ they wrote, ‘they will open themselves up to a plethora of HIPAA violations that are incredibly financially punitive.’
They then advocated that the employees stop using the counselors ‘Until FB [Facebook] affirms confidentiality has always and will always exist in those sessions.’
They also speculated that if the Accenture managers were trying to use the counseling program ‘to gather information on workers, we as workers cannot in good faith trust that anything we say to a licensed counselor could not then be used to have us terminated.’
The letter was said to have been viewed thousands of times, resulting in an internal investigation being conducted by an outsourcing manager at Facebook’s corporate office.
That person deemed there to have been ‘no violation or breach of trust between our licensed counselors and a contracted employee.’ Despite this, the person is said to have stated that Facebook would ‘continue to address this with Accenture to ensure everyone is handling this appropriately’ and that the counselors would be reminded of what they ‘can and can’t share.’
In a statement to the news site, a Facebook spokesperson said in part that ‘All of our partners must provide a resiliency plan that is reviewed and approved by Facebook’ that ‘puts the needs of their employees first.’
Accenture, meanwhile, said in part in a statement that the letter’s ‘allegations are inaccurate’ and that their employees’ ‘wellbeing is our top priority and our trust-and-safety teams in Austin have unrestricted access to wellness support.’