LinkedIn: Lara Kontakos, Social Media Content Moderator at Cognizant
Tampa/St. Petersburg, Florida
https://www.linkedin.com/in/lara-kontakos-a780778a
when I was checking Kontakos, I came up with other Cognizant people, which made me go searching the company:
30 Oct 2019: The Verge: A Facebook content moderation vendor is quitting the business after two Verge investigations
Moderators complained of filthy offices and severe mental health strain
By Casey Newton
Cognizant had hired thousands of moderators around the world to remove hate speech, terrorism, and other inappropriate content from platforms including Facebook, Google, and Twitter...
Cognizant will honor its remaining contracts but will wind down its commitments over the course of 2020, the company said...
A follow-up report in June focused on a site in Tampa, FL, where moderators broke their non-disclosure agreements to describe a pattern of mistreatment by managers. They described working in offices that were often filthy, and where cases of sexual harassment had resulted in multiple complaints being filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
The Phoenix and Tampa sites will both close after March 1st, Facebook told The Verge in a statement...
Cognizant “makes up a small percentage of Facebook’s global content review efforts,” the spokesman said. Facebook said it would increase the number of moderators it has working at a site in Texas, which is operated by Genpact.
“One of the reasons we work with partners is to be able to make adjustments quickly to ensure Facebook remains safe for people,” the spokesman said. “Cognizant’s content reviewers have played a valuable role in keeping our platforms safe for people all over the world and we thank them for the work they’ve done and continue to do.”
Related links:
The secret lives of Facebook moderators in America
Facebook moderators break their NDAs to expose desperate working conditions
Google and YouTube moderators speak out on the work that gave them PTSD
https://www.theverge.com/2019/10/30/20940956/cognizant-facebook-content-moderation-exit-business-conditions-investigation
Genpact is mentioned in The Verge article:
Wikipedia: Genpact
Genpact began in 1997 as a unit within General Electric...
In 2007, Genpact launched a joint venture with an Indian company NDTV to offer outsourcing services for the media industry.[2]
Bain Capital became the firm’s largest shareholder in October 2012...
In February 2019, Genpact contractors in Hyderabad who were assigned content moderation tasks for Facebook reportedly experienced psychological trauma while evaluating videos depicting suicide, torture, terrorism, and pornography...
On 7 January 2019, it acquired riskCanvas, an end-to-end Financial Crimes software platform, from Booz Allen Hamilton...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genpact