Facebook has asked its employees to preserve all internal documents and communications since 2016 for legal reasons as governments began to look into its operations.

The social media giant announced a “legal hold” in a company-wide email amid growing scrutiny by lawmakers over the platform’s operation.

Facebook’s practices have come under fire after a former staff whistleblower, Frances Haugen, made thousands of documents available to politicians and the media.

Ms. Hogen, who served on the company’s civil misinformation team for two years, told Congress that the company always chose profit over the safety of its users and was aware of the spread of misinformation.

And she said Facebook had conducted covert research that showed teens felt worse about themselves after using the company’s products.

“As you probably know, we are currently focusing on extensive media coverage based on internal documents,” Facebook said in an email to employees Tuesday. the new York Times.

“As is often the case after such reporting, several inquiries have been launched from governments and legislative bodies into the company’s operations.”

Earlier this month, Senate Commerce Committee Chair Maria Cantwell demanded that CEO Mark Zuckerberg preserve all documents related to the testimony given by Ms.

“On Tuesday, Facebook sent a legal stop notice to all personnel. Document protection requests are part of the process of responding to legal inquiries,” a Facebook spokesperson confirmed.

But not all parts of Facebook’s business are included in the hold.

“You are not required to protect documents or communications that are specifically about WhatsApp as a company product,” the email said.

“You should keep all WhatsApp messages related to other topics safe.”