Meta has paused a new company-wide program of tracking its employees’ computer usage which has been plagued by internal frustration.

The program was started only two months ago as part of an effort by Meta to gather data on how people used computers, including mouse clicks and keystrokes, that could be used to train artificial intelligence (AI) models.

It was met immediately with upset from employees who were to have their every online action at work tracked and recorded, but also concerned about where the data was going and how it would be protected.

Meta halted the program on Monday after realising some of the collected data had been left potentially accessible to anyone inside the company.

A Meta spokesman confirmed to the BBC that the program, named internally the Model Capability Initiative (MCI), was “on pause for now” as the company investigates the issue.

“We have no indication at this time that any data was improperly accessed by Meta employees,” the spokesman added.

The pause follows weeks of blow-back from workers at the company, led by billionaire Mark Zuckerberg, to being tracked at work.

In an initial response to worker frustration – which was displayed in part through a petition signed by nearly 2,000 Meta workers demanding that the MCI program be cancelled – Meta said it would allow workers to not be tracked for up to 30 minutes at a time.

“That was just an attempt at damage control,” one current employee told the BBC. The person asked not to be identified.

Another Meta employee, who also asked not to be identified, said that while a lot of technical workers inside the company are open to the idea of improving its AI models and being more competitive in a field dominated by Anthropic and OpenAI, the fact that tracking “was forced on us, there was no consent” left people angry.

“I’ve never seen morale here so bad,” the employee said.

In addition to the tracking program, frustration inside Meta has grown as it has done extensive layoffs, and reorganised many employees and their work around AI initiatives, on which the company is spending up to $145bn (£109bn) this year alone.

Employees have even openly insulted management, external in an internal meeting on the AI-driven changes, according to a report in Wired.

While Meta has long had a reputation in the technology industry as a company that frequently reorganises internal teams around new projects, the changes and spending in an effort to catch up on AI feels like “chasing your tail”, a person who recently left Meta after several years said.

“The direction this company is going in is depressing”, the former employee said. “Exhausting and depressing.”

Miriam Tuerk
Co-Founder, CEO & Director

Good morning. This presentation is being recorded for further viewing after the webinar is completed. My name is Miriam Tuerk. I’m Co-Founder and CEO of Clear Blue Technologies. I’m joined today by Farrukh Anwar, who’s our CFO; and Jonathan van der Veen, who’s Head of our Marketing function within the company.

Today, we’re going to be going over our fiscal 2025 and Q1 2026 earnings results and try to give you as much information as we can from a forward outlook perspective. With respect to forward outlook perspective, please be aware always the guidance that’s around forward-looking statements we’re giving the best information we have at the time that we have it, but there is nothing that can promise what’s going to happen in the future. So please take that under advisement.

So just a little bit about Clear Blue. Clear Blue is a world leader in delivering clean, managed wireless power to meet the global need for reliable, low-cost energy for mission-critical infrastructure. Why do I say the word world leader? We don’t deliver large solar infrastructure that feeds into the grid. We deliver off-grid power that is disconnected from the grid for small point-of-use applications, satellite systems, WiFi networks, smart city infrastructure, security cameras, street lights, cell phone towers.

And when it comes to that, we build the technology, but we also manage and deliver it on an ongoing basis. We’ve been doing that since day 1 when we had our first prototype in 2011, and we’ve been remotely managing and monitoring that — those systems online with an ongoing service since day 1. As

However the promised new jobs from projects is down on 2024-25

Wales has seen a rise in inward investment projects although the number of new jobs promised has fallen.

Figures from the UK Government’s Department for Business & Trade show that in 2025-26 Wales attracted 75 inward investment projects – which as well as overseas firms investing in Wales for the first time included expansions by companies already here – compared to 65 in the previous financial year.

The new projects promise to create 1,617 jobs, compared to 2,470 from foreign direct investment in the previous year.

New jobs and safeguarded from foreign direct investment in Wales amounted to 5,585 , up from 4,122 a year earlier.

For the UK as a whole there were 1,020 new inward investment projects – down from 1,375 a year earlier – that promised to create 69,166 jobs (69,355 previously).

In terms of origination some 239 projects into the UK came from US firms and investors, followed by India, 93, France 64, Germany 62 and Ireland 45.

London attracted around a third of all total UK projects with 326, followed in number by the north west, 115. Scotland attracted 94 and Northern Ireland 33. The lowest on number was the north east of England with 23.

While the Welsh Government has devolved powers to support efforts to attract foreign direct investment into Wales, the UK Government also has a role.

For the new Plaid Cymru Cardiff Bay administration inward investment will sit within a new at arm’s length development agency for Wales. It will also look to support greater links between inward investors and indigenous supply chains as a means of bolstering Welsh productivity levels.

Secretary of State for Wales, Jo Steven, said: “These latest figures show that Wales is punching above its weight. The UK Government is backing the industries of the future in Wales and creating the right conditions to attract yet more investment.

“This has been a driving motivation behind our new initiative, Brand Wales, which is designed to attract inward investment and promote Wales as a brilliant place to do business. We want to ensure that the economic opportunities offered by Wales sit at the forefront of the minds of global investors.”

Cabinet Minister for Enterprise, Connectivity and Energy, Adam Price, said:“Inward investment can play a crucial part in our goal to half the productivity gap with the rest of the UK. It’s encouraging to see Wales bucking the trend as the only part of the UK to see an increase in inward investment projects.

“But to meet our productivity goal we need to ensure that investment creates resilient and well-paid jobs and contributes to the long-term competitiveness and performance of the Welsh economy.

“Inward investment should strengthen Welsh firms, deepen supply chains, support priority economic platforms, increase exports, bring technology or management capability into Wales, and help retain more value in the Welsh economy. A new Welsh innovation and development agency will lead our approach to inward investment and make Wales the easiest place in the UK for investors to say yes. “Above all, investment must deliver for the people of Wales and lead to higher productivity and shared prosperity.”

The foreign direct investment figures also include those as a result of mergers and acquisitions.

Laura Doel comes from a long line of family trade unionists

TUC Cymru has confirmed Laura Doel as its new general secretary. Ms Doel is currently the national secretary for Wales of the National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT) and the current TUC Cymru president.

She will replace Shavannah Taj who was elected as a Labour member of the Senedd in May.

A passionate trade unionist and education campaigner, she started her career in journalism working at several newspapers, including the Newport Argus, before moving into politics.

A stint in local government reignited a love of social activism and campaigning which turned into a career in the trade union movement. She began that career as an organiser for Unison, then an organiser for NAHT Cymru before becoming their National Secretary six years ago.

In her role as national secretary she held a number of key roles including NAHT Cymru’s seat on Wales TUC general council, as well as a number of key Welsh Government union positions under social partnership legislation including the National Attendance Task Force, the Pay Partnership Forum, the workload negotiating groups and Schools Social Partnership Forum.

Born and brought up in Aberbeeg, near Abertillery, she now lives in Cardiff with her two daughters. She attended Abertillery Comprehensive School before going to college in Ebbw Vale and Pontypool. She comes from a long line of trade unionists. She is the first female trade union official in her family following in the footsteps of her dad, grandfathers, and wider family who all worked in manufacturing, local collieries, steelworks, and local government.

The incoming general secretary said: “I am honoured to be appointed to the role of TUC Cymru general secretary, and I look forward to representing Wales’s nearly 400,000 trade unionists as we work together to build a Wales that works for everyone.

“I believe that trade unions have never been more important. Wales is experiencing a moment of significant change, with a new government in place, continued pressures on pay-packets, and a world of work that is transformed compared to what has come before.

“The workers of Wales need to know that there is someone on their side and I look forward to taking up that challenge in the coming weeks.”

Iran has denied a claim by Vice-President JD Vance that it will allow nuclear inspectors back into the country, after the first round of talks between Washington and Tehran to reach a final deal to end the war.

Following negotiations in Switzerland, Vance said on Monday that discussions with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) could be happening “as soon as today”.

But Iran’s foreign ministry told state media that Tehran had made “no new commitments” on nuclear inspections.

Iran and the US continued to share conflicting remarks on the nuclear issue on Tuesday.

Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei said it had no plans to allow inspectors to access nuclear sites bombed by the US and Israel last year.

US President Donald Trump said that despite Iran’s “protestations and false statements to the contrary”, it had “fully and completely agreed” to inspections.

“If they did not agree to this, there would be no further negotiations!” he posted on social media.

Meanwhile, the US has temporarily waived sanctions, allowing Iran to sell oil in US dollars for the first time in decades.

In a joint statement released on Monday, mediators Qatar and Pakistan said that after the first round of talks in the Swiss resort of Bürgenstock, the US and Iran had agreed to “a roadmap towards reaching a final deal within 60 days”.

Vance described the talks as having laid a “very good foundation”.

The US vice-president said the teams had discussed the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz and “de-confliction for the regional ceasefire”.

The 60-day sanctions waiver issued by the US Treasury on Monday dismantles central pillars of Washington’s long-running embargo, which has historically choked off Tehran’s economy.

The emergency licence authorises the production, sale and delivery of Iranian crude and petrochemicals until 21 August.

Iranian oil can even be imported directly into the US, under the sanctions relief.

It unlocks banking transactions, insurance and transportation and does away with the complex networks that Iran has previously used to sell crude.