Facebook’s chief of advertising integrity, who oversaw the company’s ad products on controversial topics such as politics and coronavirus disinformation, resigned this week, according to an internal company article reported by Reuters on Friday.
Rob Leathern, Director of Product Marketing, said earlier this month on Facebook’s internal network that he would be leaving the company on 30 December. His resignation had not been mentioned before.
Facebook could not be asked for comment immediately.
Leathern said in the post that he was “leaving Facebook to work on consumer privacy beyond just ads and social media,” without revealing where he was heading.
Leathern was also the public face of the company’s contentious stance on political advertising. Before the US election on 3 November, Facebook was sharply criticized for encouraging false statements and conspiracy theories to spread extensively through its channels.
In November, Leathern tweeted that Facebook had no technical ability in the short term to enable political ads by state or by the advertiser. Subsequently, Facebook lifted a temporary post-election ban on political ads in Georgia before the January 5 runoff to decide which party dominates the US Senate.
