Meta (Facebook) COO Sheryl Sandberg Announces She’s Stepping Down in the Fall Amid Reports She Tried to Have Stories Killed

Mark Zuckerberg’s longtime deputy Sheryl Sandberg said Wednesday that she’s quitting her job as Meta’s chief operating officer.

Sandberg, who’s worth an estimated $1.6 billion according to Forbes, said in a surprise Facebook post that she will step down in the fall and remain a member of the company’s board of directors.

“When I took this job in 2008, I hoped I would be in this role for five years,” Sandberg said. “Fourteen years later, it is time for me to write the next chapter of my life.”

The news comes six weeks after the Wall Street Journal reported that Sandberg had twice pressured the Daily Mail to kill potentially damaging stories about her then-boyfriend Bobby Kotick.

According to the Journal, Kotick told associates that Sandberg warned the Daily Mail that any article they published regarding the situation could hurt the outlet’s relationship with Facebook – whose platform is a considerable source of traffic and revenue for countless media outlets.

Meta, which is reportedly probing the allegations against Sandberg, did not immediately respond to a request for comment on her resignation.

Sandberg is also the author of “Lean In,” a motivational book about women in the workplace. She worked at Google prior to joining Facebook.

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