Facebook has announced plans to hire 1,000 people in Ireland this year.

The announcement was made by the company's COO Sheryl Sandberg, who is in Dublin for events including Facebook's 'Gather' event in Croke Park.

The new jobs will be across 60 teams, in areas including engineering, safety, legal, marketing, sales and policy.

It comes as the company prepares to move from its Irish and EMEA headquarters from Grand Canal Dock to a new campus in Ballsbridge.

Facebook is also set to triple its investment in online safety programmes - run by the National Anti-Bullying Centre and SpunOut.ie - to €1 million.

Speaking in Dublin, Mrs Sandberg also acknowledged that Facebook is a very different company than it was a year ago.

She pledged that the company will continue to tackle areas that have proven controversial for the social media - such as fake news, election interference and more transparency on the decisions it makes.

Facebook Ireland chief Gareth Lambe, meanwhile, said that issues with housing in Dublin haven't blocked its employment plans here so far.

He argued that the company supports moves being made by the Government, and believes that will address the "glut" in a few years.

He added: "One thing from our point of view that we hope is going to help us in that regard is our move to the campus in Ballsbridge - that gets us out of the Grand Canal Dock, city centre area where a lot of our employees were living.

"With access to the DART station there, we're hoping they'll really widen the net of the areas they go to live."

Mr Lambe spoke to Newstalk's Jess Kelly earlier, and you can hear more from the interview via the player below:

Facebook currently has around 4,000 employees in Ireland, and has facilities in Cork, Meath, and Dublin.