Hundreds of employees in Ireland tasked with refining Meta’s AI models have been told their jobs are in jeopardy as the company begins a new round of layoffs, according to documents obtained by WIRED.
The affected employees are employed by Dublin-based firm Covalen, which manages various content rating and meta-tagging services.
Employees were notified of the layoffs via video conference Monday afternoon and were not allowed to ask questions, according to Nick Bennett, one of the employees on the phone. “We had a very bad feeling [before the meeting],” he says: “This has happened before.”
In all, more than 700 employees may lose their jobs at Covalen, according to an email reviewed by WIRED. About 500 data annotations. Their job is to check the content generated by the Meta AI models against the company’s rules that prohibit harmful and illegal content. “It’s actually training AI to take over our jobs,” said one Covalen employee, who asked not to be named for fear of retaliation. “We take steps as a good decision for AI to imitate.”
Sometimes, the job involves cooking up elaborate instructions to try to bypass the streets meant to prevent the models from giving child sexual abuse, mentions, or suicidal explanations. “It’s really hard work,” Bennett said. “You spend your whole day pretending to be a child abuser.”
Last week, Meta announced plans to cut one in ten jobs as part of layoffs aimed at streamlining the company. The memo released by the company is reported to have revealed that the layoffs are motivated by the need to raise funds for other business activities. Although the memo did not mention AI, the company recently announced plans to nearly double its use of the technology. In January, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said, “I think 2026 will be the year that AI will start to change the way we work.” In an email reviewed by WIRED, Covalen employees were told only that the layoffs were the result of “reduced demand and operational requirements.”
The latest round of layoffs marks the second time Covalen has reduced staff in recent months. In November, the company announced plans to cut jobs (reportedly up to 400), which led to a labor strike. Between two rounds of layoffs, Covalen’s Dublin workforce is about to dwindle, according to the Communication Workers’ Union (CWU), whose members include Covalen workers.
For the affected Covalen workers, their search for a new job will be interrupted by a six-month “cooling off period” during which they cannot apply to a competing Meta vendor, the CWU said. “It’s not honorable, you know,” said a Covalen employee who asked not to be named. “It’s rude.”
Meta and Covalen did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Unions representing the affected workers want Covalen to enter into negotiations regarding the terms of the layoffs. They hope to meet with the Irish government to discuss how AI affects the workforce in the country. “Technology companies treat the workers who help build AI as expendable,” said Christy Hoffman, general secretary of the UNI Global Union. “To fight back, it is very important for workers to plan and seek notice about the introduction of AI, training linked to employment, and their future plan. Workers should also have the right to refuse to train AI replacements.”
But some of those caught up in the layoffs are questioning their chances of finding stable work in a labor market re-engineered in real-time by AI and the deep-pocketed companies leading its development. Bennett says: “It’s a global battle between the oppressed and the big workers, really. “That usually only goes one way.”
