Facebook’s chief of advertising integrity, who handled the company’s ad products around sensitive subjects such as politics and coronavirus misinformation, departed this week, according to an internal company post.
Rob Leathern, director of product management, said earlier this month on Facebook’s internal network that he would be leaving the company on Dec. 30.
After almost 4 years, I made the difficult decision to leave Facebook, and 12/30/20 was my last day at FB. I’ve had a great experience in a difficult, fun, fast-growing and impactful role at the company working with amazing people. I was honored to call them colleagues! (1/12)
— Rob Leathern (@robleathern) January 1, 2021
Prior to the Nov. 3 U.S. election, Facebook was heavily criticized for allowing misleading claims and conspiracy theories to spread widely on its platforms. In November, Leathern had tweeted that Facebook did not have “the technical ability in the short term to enable political ads by state or by advertiser.”
In a tweet Rob Leathern, said that while he’s not going to be working on ads directly, it will be a part of what he works on as he will be staying in the tech/data/privacy space.
