META Meta Platforms Inc

By Stu Woo 

LONDON-- Facebook Inc. has hired one of Britain's best-known politicians as its top policy and communications executive, giving a Silicon Valley outsider the task of mending the social network's image as it deals with increased political scrutiny in the U.S. and abroad.

Facebook said Friday that Nick Clegg, who as deputy prime minister was Britain's No. 2 leader from 2010 to 2015, would replace Elliot Schrage, who said in June that he was stepping down.

Mr. Clegg starts his new job Monday and will move to California in January. Mr. Schrage will remain at Facebook and report to Chief Operating Officer Sandberg as an adviser, focusing for now on helping Mr. Clegg transition to his new role, according to a Facebook spokeswoman.

Mr. Clegg's recruitment comes as trust in Facebook has eroded in 2018 and as Silicon Valley faces growing scrutiny from European regulators on several fronts.

Outrage grew this spring over allegations that data firm Cambridge Analytica improperly accessed information on tens of millions of Facebook users and that Russian-backed propagandists had exploited the social network.

More recently, hackers, believed to be spammers, gained access to the private information of 30 million Facebook users.

Facebook officials have been busy explaining the recent breach to Washington and foreign governments, including in the U.K. In Brussels, Facebook could face a European Union fine of as much as $1.63 billion.

Although unknown in Silicon Valley, Mr. Clegg brings insight from one of Facebook's toughest battlegrounds: the European Union.

The 28-country bloc increasingly sees itself as a bulwark against U.S. technology giants that it views as overpowered. It has probed the tax arrangements of U.S. tech companies including Apple Inc. and has clashed with Google on several fronts, most recently issuing the search giant a $5 billion fine for allegedly abusing the dominance of its Android mobile-phone software. Google is appealing.

The EU gained a new tool this spring when data-protection rules, called the General Data Protection Regulation, went into effect, with regulators having the power to fine companies that don't comply.

Mr. Zuckerberg and Ms. Sandberg spent a lot of time with Mr. Clegg before hiring him, said a person familiar with the process.

In a Facebook post, Ms. Sandberg said the company faced serious challenges and "now more than ever" needed new perspectives.

"His [Mr. Clegg's] experience and ability to work through complex issues will be invaluable in the years to come," she said.

The move is arguably Facebook's most high-profile external hire since poaching Ms. Sandberg from Google in 2008. As part of its search, Facebook spoke with a number of prominent public-policy and communications officials on Wall Street and some with ties to the Obama administration, according to people familiar with the process.

Among those who were interviewed or approached about the job were Denis McDonough, former White house chief of staff under Obama; Jay Carney, the former White House press secretary who is now senior vice president of global corporate affairs at Amazon.com; Jake Sullivan, a former senior policy adviser to Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign; and Jake Siewert, the head of corporate communications at Goldman Sachs Group Inc., according to people familiar with the process.

For the last decade, Facebook's policy and communications strategy has been set by Mr. Schrage, who currently reports to Ms. Sandberg. He has been the architect of Facebook's response to various controversies over the last two years.

Mr. Clegg will have to manage a more hostile regulatory environment for tech companies as well as increasingly aggressive reportage by the media. Facebook insiders expect deeper regulation of its business and the new policy chief will play a major role in pushing for laws that favor the company.

That is particularly true in Europe, where Mr. Clegg has the most expertise and where EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager has emerged as one of the most aggressive regulators of big tech companies such as Facebook.

Mr. Clegg knows Brussels well, having previously worked for the European Commission, partly as a trade negotiator, before entering politics. Mr. Clegg, who speaks several European languages, was also a European lawmaker.

He said Friday in a Facebook post that the social network had a responsibility not only to its users but society at large, and that it was at the heart of complex issues such as privacy and free speech.

His appointment surprised Britain's political world Friday. He led the Liberal Democrats, a centrist group traditionally viewed as the country's third-biggest political party, from 2007 to 2015. He became deputy prime minister in 2010 after the Liberal Democrats joined the Conservatives in a governing coalition that lasted until his party faltered in the 2015 election. Mr. Clegg lost his own seat as a lawmaker in Britain's parliament in 2017.

Since then, Mr. Clegg has been a vocal advocate for the European Union, calling for a second referendum on the U.K.'s membership. Britain is set to leave the bloc in 2019.

The hire comes as Facebook's upper ranks undergo a major upheaval, some of which has sparked infighting between Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg and other senior executives over the direction of the company.

In the past year, 10 senior and highly visible executives have left or announced their departures, including the co-founders of Instagram and WhatsApp, two companies that Facebook bought years ago to power its user and revenue growth. Several longstanding lieutenants have also left, including Mr. Schrage, Dan Rose, vice president of partnerships, and Colin Stretch, Facebook's general counsel.

Meanwhile, several public funds holding Facebook stock are backing a proposal to push out Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg as the board's chairman.

Write to Stu Woo at Stu.Woo@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

October 19, 2018 10:59 ET (14:59 GMT)

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