Meta employees allege bias in AI-driven layoffs
26 Meta employees have filed a lawsuit accusing the tech giant of using artificial intelligence to select workers for mass layoffs, and the trillion-dollar company strongly denies the claim, Qazinform News Agency reports, citing JIJI Press.
Meta announced it would lay off about 8,000 employees in Spring, roughly 10 percent of its workforce, to reallocate resources toward an ambitious AI initiative.
The lawsuit, filed in Oakland, California, on Monday, claims that Meta relied on AI systems to score, rank, and select employees for layoffs rather than the considered judgment of managers who knew the work, while disproportionately targeting those on medical or family leave.
The AI systems used performance ratings, calibration scores, and productivity and output metrics – measures that employees on medical or family leave cannot accumulate and that may be lowered for employees with disabilities.
Meta did not pause the system for the individualized, leave- and accommodation-neutral review the law requires, according to the 71-page complaint.
According to the note, all 26 employees took or requested protected leave or requested or received a reasonable accommodation for disability.
Workforce management and organizational decisions were and are made by people, not AI, according to a Meta spokesperson, as reported by multiple US outlets, including CNBC and the Verge.
A Meta spokesperson told CNBC by email that the claims lack merit and are not fact-based. Meta did not immediately respond to AFP's request for comment.
Meta's cuts are fueling a massive race for infrastructure, with the company planning to invest up to $145 billion in AI this year, nearly double last year's figure.
Earlier, Qazinform News Agency reported that Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, announced plans to invest more than $9.1 billion to build its first artificial intelligence data center in Canada, its largest outside the United States.
