Employees of NBC’s digital news division announced on Wednesday that they intend to form a union representing about 150 workers, saying it would allow them to fight for better job protections as well as publicly criticize NBC News executives without fear of retaliation.

Leaders of the network’s news division have come under renewed scrutiny this month with the publication of Ronan Farrow’s “Catch and Kill.” In the book, the author paints a damning portrait of the NBC News chairman Andrew Lack and the division president Noah Oppenheim, accusing leadership of interfering with his reporting on Harvey Weinstein and mishandling the allegations against the former “Today” anchor Matt Lauer, who was fired in 2017.

Last week, Rachel Maddow, the highest-rated anchor on MSNBC, confronted her bosses live on air as part of an episode that had Mr. Farrow as a guest, questioning their handling of his reporting when he was a contributor to the network. She also raised the issue of why NBCUniversal had not commissioned an independent review of Mr. Lauer’s workplace behavior and the company’s response to it.

The digital employees seeking to form a union referred to the internal strife in a letter to NBC management that noted “serious questions” on how the news division has handled workplace sexual misconduct and its “opaque” procedures for “exposing powerful predators.”