Facebook

Facebook supports digital inclusivity for women through its #SheMeansBusiness programme that helps women-owned enterprises in various countries participate in the digital economy. The company has integrated several accessibility features into its products to help people with hearing and visual impairments. It also discloses the number of people with disabilities employed within the company and supports initiatives focused on increasing accessibility for people with disabilities.

The company contributes to digital skills development through its support for the programme African Masters of Machine Intelligence, which provides graduate education in AI in Africa. It also supports school connectivity in Nigeria through its Express Wi-Fi programme.

Facebook considers privacy a material topic and publishes a report on government requests it receives for user information every year. It has a mechanism to report online harms to children on its platforms and also partners with other companies in The Technology Coalition to build tools to protect children from online sexual exploitation and abuse. Furthermore, the company has several resources for parents on online child safety education.

Facebook demonstrates support for open innovation through membership in standards bodies, sharing of source code as well as supporting university research on AI. The company also contributes to sustainability research by providing big data sets. It follows best practice by reporting the number of women in technical roles at the company.

There is an opportunity for Facebook to support open access to digital technologies for vulnerable groups. The company should also report how the economic value it generates is distributed among its stakeholders, as well as income taxes paid and employment in its main markets of operation.

Facebook has an opportunity to support basic digital skills development and conduct impact assessments of its existing programmes in the area.

Facebook has the opportunity to enhance trust by following best practice and reporting on senior-level oversight of and accountability for cybersecurity. The company can also disclose how it monitors and remedies security incidents, and its number of data breaches. Additionally, the company should adopt a group-level privacy policy with principles that are applicable to all subsidiaries and users regardless of location. Moreover, while Facebook has several initiatives around child online safety, it should make a high-level policy commitment to protecting children online and provide parental controls on its platforms.

There are opportunities for Facebook to enhance its support for the tech innovation ecosystem and to disclose the ethical guidelines it follows in its R&D, particularly its AI activities.

Facebook commits to respecting human rights and the ILO core labour rights. It also has a publicly available policy statement that expects its business relationships to commit to respecting the ILO core labour rights. The company identifies and assesses its salient human rights issues in its own operations and identifies and engages with stakeholders whose human rights have been or may be impacted by its operations. However, the company does not disclose how it integrates the findings of its assessments of human rights risks and impacts into relevant processes. The company has a grievance mechanism for workers to raise human rights concerns and complaints, but it is unclear whether this mechanism is accessible to external stakeholders.

Facebook publicly commits to respecting the health and safety of workers, and it places health and safety expectations on its business relationships and monitors their performance. The company is not explicit in stating that it does not require workers to work more than regular and overtime hours. It also does not disclose the percentage of its workforce covered by collective bargaining agreements, and it provides no relevant evidence in relation to paying its workers a living wage. Facebook publicly commits to gender equality and women’s empowerment and has time-bound targets on the subject. The company also discloses the proportion of employees in different employee categories by gender and ethnicity. However, it has an opportunity to provide this information for more indicators of diversity, such as age group, per employee category.

Facebook has a policy prohibiting bribery and corruption, but it does not include anti-bribery and anti-corruption clauses in its contracts with business relationships. The company has a global tax strategy. However, it does not disclose income tax payments in its individual tax jurisdictions. Furthermore, the company discloses its approach to lobbying and political engagement, but it states that it makes political contributions when permitted by law. Moreover, Facebook only discloses its lobbying expenditures for its US operations.

The below datasheet disaggregates scores within the three core social measurement areas and by specific indicators.