‘Facebook secretly drains your phone battery’
A former Meta employee reveals how the company deliberately conducts testing with Facebook, which has a negative impact on the user. For example, it may happen that the battery of your phone is empty faster as a result of these tests.
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Negative impact Facebook app
Data scientist George Hayward, a former Meta employee, exposes negative practices about Facebook. At The New York Post, he talks about how Facebook developers are testing the app remotely, which has consequences for users.
This is a practical test better known as ‘negative testing’. That is, developers deliberately expose their app to all kinds of unexpected circumstances and problems in order to see how the app handles it. That in itself is nothing strange and in most cases it is a good thing that these tests take place, but things are getting out of hand at Facebook, says Hayward.
‘Helping the masses’
He explains to the newspaper how Facebook’s tests ensure that the battery of users’ smartphones drains faster, without users being able to know anything about it. So it happens secretly in the background as a result of negative testing. When Hayward refused to run these tests, he was fired from Meta.
“I said to the manager: ‘This can harm people’. She said that some are affected, but that we are helping the masses with this.” Hayward explained to The New York Post.
The damage Hayward is talking about refers to situations where users may have to notify emergency services in an emergency, but suddenly find themselves with a dead smartphone battery. on the other hand, a phone battery also wears out faster if smartphones are charged more often. Users will eventually buy a new device more quickly.
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Story on one side
There is an important caveat to this story about the negative impact of the Facebook app on users’ phones. It remains a statement from a former employee, who may have certain frustrations about his dismissal. That may therefore influence his statements. So we only get one side of the story.
Completely apart from that, it is of course possible that Facebook does indeed drain our smartphone batteries faster than necessary in the background. What do you think of these statements by Hayward. Does this story make you consider deleting the Facebook app and using the web version instead? Let us know in the comments.
