This April, Sophie Zhang told the world about her employer’s failure to combat deception and abuse. Her advice? No screenshots, lawyer up – and trust yourself
![How to blow the whistle on Facebook – from someone who already did](https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/34ff0931a214287d1dccf407e6dfa1818ed6334a/0_0_1500_900/master/1500.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdGctZGVmYXVsdC5wbmc&enable=upscale&s=ac231ab5cdedeeb2c886bed1f7ef9af9)
Two years ago, I did something I almost never do: I put on a dress. Then I dropped my phone and other electronics off at the home of
Friends who had agreed to tell anyone who asked that I was at their place the entire time, and headed to the Oakland offices of the Guardian for my first meeting with a reporter.
Leaving my electronics was a safeguard against possible tracking by my then employer,
Facebook. The dress was an additional layer of alibi: I theorized that if anyone from work saw me and could contradict my first alibi, they might conclude that my unusual behavior was evidence of nothing more than an affair.