Facebook spends $5 million on lobbying as whistleblower leaks spark probe

Facebook Inc spent $5.1 million on lobbying in the third quarter, again boosting its Washington expenditures as internal documents leaked by a whistle-blower sparked fresh allegations of misleading Congress, the public and securities regulators.

The social media company’s lobbying outlays represented a 6.7% increase from last quarter and a 3.9% increase compared to the third quarter of 2020. The amount outpaced other technology giants like Amazon.com Inc, Microsoft Corp and Alphabet Inc’s Google.