Facebook contractor hikes pay for Indian content reviewers

Facebook contractor Genpact has raised minimum wages for the content moderation teams it runs for the Silicon Valley firm in India, the latest sign of improvement for workers after reports of stressful conditions at the social network’s sites globally. Facebook Inc has unveiled several initiatives in the past six months to support wellbeing in teams doing the sometimes grueling and repetitive work of wading through billions of potentially harmful or violent posts on its platforms.

Reuters reported in February on a group of workers at Genpact’s offices in the southern Indian city of Hyderabad, who described the work they did as underpaid, stressful and sometimes traumatic. Facebook at that time rejected the Hyderabad employees’ assertions about low pay, saying it paid competitive wages for the Indian market. Two sources familiar with the matter told Reuters on Friday that Genpact has since more than doubled minimum salaries for new recruits to its Facebook teams to 250,000 Indian rupees ($3,503) a year.