Meta Contractors Protest Layoffs In European Headquarters, Say They Are Treated Different Than Employees

Meta contractors protested at the company’s European headquarters, saying their layoff packages are different than the ones given to full-time employees.

Wired detailed that the protest took place in Dublin. It impacts 700 workers employed by Covalen, which handles content moderation and data labeling services, citing “reduced demand.”

A large amount of workers won’t receive a severance package, with the company saying it is because they have been employed for less than two years. Others are being given the minimum package required by local labor laws: two weeks of pay for every year worked.

Workers voted to strike outside Covalen’s office and march to Meta’s European headquarters. They are asking double of what is being offered for those getting severance and some type of compensation for those who are not getting anything.

Meta has begun conducting 8,000 layoffs, impacting about 10% of the company, which has also scrapped plans to fill 6,000 open positions.

The company ended the first quarter of 2026 with 77,900 employees, down 1% on the final quarter of 2025, following earlier rounds of redundancies. Those previous cuts were pitched as a way to streamline operations after heavy spending on the metaverse. This time, executives are far more explicit that jobs are being traded for computing power.

Company CEO Mark Zuckerberg said “we are seeing more and more examples where one or two people are building something in a week that would have previously taken dozens of people months.”

Zuckerberg also told employees that success “isn’t a given.” “AI is the most consequential technology of our lifetimes,” he said. He added that the company is transforming itself to “make sure it will always be the best place for talented people to have the greatest impact.”

“People tell us that they appreciate the ability to take greater ownership and execute their vision with less bureaucracy and management to navigate,” he added.

The finance head of the company, Susan Li, said during the earnings call from the first quarter that leadership doesn’t “really know what the optimal size of the company will be in the future.”

Employees are also protesting against the company’s decision to implement a technology tracking their mouse movement and keystrokes to train its AI model, according to a recent report.

Reuters detailed that employees are distributing flyers across U.S. offices encouraging colleagues to sign an online petition against the initiative. “Don’t want to work at the Employee Data ​Extraction Factory?” the flyer says.

The petition in question claims that “when employees asked what privacy reviews were conducted, including any ‘people data reviews’ (which are required for processing employee data), no completed privacy reviews were provided.”