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Meta has rescinded a job offer to a candidate after he condemned Instagram for its failure due address ‘sextortion’ on a public webinar.
Paul Raffile, a cyber-intelligence analyst who specializes in human exploitation including sextortion and trafficking, had been handed a $175,000-a-year contract, according to a report by the Guardian.
The tech company planned to hire Raffile to focus on eliminating financial sextortion – where victims are tricked into privately sharing sexually explicit photos before being threatened with exposure unless they pay a ransom – on its platforms, among other forms of exploitation.
On April 24, Raffile co-organized and participated in a webinar on the topic of safeguarding against financial sextortion. During the event, he criticized the social media platform for failing to deal with the threat of scammers and highlighted the impact it has on children who use the platform.
“The only reason I can think of for the offer being rescinded is me trying to shine a light on this big issue of these crimes happening on Instagram, and Instagram doing little to prevent it so far,” Raffile told the Guardian, adding that he only spoke for less than a minute to introduce the event.
The webinar included the parents of four children who lost their lives following scams on Instagram. Employees from Meta, Google, Visa, and Snap were all in attendance, alongside members of law enforcement agencies and the National Center of Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC). 350 people attended the webinar in total.
Meta, in a statement to the Guardian, rejected Raffile’s claims, though did not provide an alternative justification for revoking the offer. “It’s not accurate to imply the offer was rescinded because of the NCRI report, the webinar or the candidate’s expertise in this space,” a spokesperson said.
Raffile was due to begin his new role just five days later, on April 29th, but says he was informed “within hours” of the webinar that his offer was rescinded. The human exploitation expert claims he was not given a reason but was told the decision came from “many pay-levels above us.”
“It shows that Meta is not willing to take this issue seriously,” he states. “I’ve brought up legitimate concerns and recommendations, and they’re potentially unwilling to be aggressive enough to tackle this issue.”
Over 26,700 underage victims were reported to the NCMEC in 2023, with financial sextortion rapidly accelerating in the US. The FBI reports more than 20 teenage suicides due to threats and sextortion from scammers from October 2021 and March 2023.
Meta has reiterated it has a strict zero-tolerance ban on the non-consensual sharing of intimate imagery.
Raffile, are former worker at consulting companies including Booz Allen Hamilton and Teneo, told the Guardian that platforms like Meta are falling far behind other tech companies on the issue.
“I had squared off against Yahoo Boys at previous employers, which were financial institutions and tech companies,” he said. “We were able to eradicate them from our platforms in four to six months. Yet, the social media platforms have had two years to deal with this.”
