Facebook has hired hundreds of extra staff members to transcribe the private conversations of its users.
The staff members were "rattled" by the work, according to Bloomberg, who reported that hundreds of external contractors were handed audio clips with no context and told to transcribe them.
The transcribers did not know why Facebook needed the audio from its users' audio conversations transcribed. According to the report, the audio occasionally contained "vulgar" content. The staff working on the transcriptions spoke to reporters on the condition of anonymity, as they feared Facebook would fire them if they spoke publicly about the work, reports news.com.au.
Facebook confirmed to Bloomberg that it hired contractors to transcribe the conversations of its users.
"Much like Apple and Google, we paused human review of audio more than a week ago," the company said on Tuesday.