So what, they set out to make a speech-generating AI tool and only after they finished it realized that they had made a speech-generating AI tool?
The engineer/maker types sometimes fail to consider second order effects of whatever they are building if the coolness factor is high enough.
The trouble is, this is already partly here and going to be increasingly available. For smaller startups that already do this like ElevenLabs, they have no reason to hold back, as it's there entire business, Meta can for now, but it's a fruitless exercise. These tools are coming.
Meta doesn't want the flack hurting or causing investigations into it's current business is more what it means, it will release the tool when others have released there's and it will no longer be the one to blame.