U.S. and Britain investigate Facebook data breach, Zuckerberg was summoned

Facebook data breach

The morning of March 21st, this Tuesday, British lawmakers said that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg should testify on the relationship between the company and the political analysis company Cambridge Analytica. Last weekend, the “Observer” and “The New York Times” released a report that revealed that an application called “thisisyourdigitallife” collected 50 million Facebook users’ data and transferred the data to Cambridge Analytica, a political analysis company based in London.

Cambridge Analytica participated in the 2016 U.S. election campaign for the Trump team and provided Trump teams with detailed information about voters.

Image: thatsnonsense

Zuckerberg has been silent about this incident so far, but British MPs would like to hear what he said. Member Damian Collins sent a letter to Zuckerberg on Tuesday and asked him to testify on the digital, cultural, media and sports committees.

The e-mail said: “The committee has repeatedly informed Facebook about how the company has acquired and kept user data, especially without the user’s consent. Your response has consistently underestimated this risk and misled the committee.” Collins asked Zuckerberg to respond before March 26.

Zuckerberg announced earlier this year that the individual challenge in 2018 was to fix Facebook’s problems. However, many investors are criticizing his handling of Cambridge Analytica. Collins said it is time for Zuckerberg to stand up. He said: “It is time to listen to the opinions of a senior Facebook executive with sufficient authority. He should accurately describe the catastrophic failure of the entire process.”

“Protection of users involves significant public interest. Therefore, we are convinced that you can understand the necessity of having the top representatives of the organization to solve problems. Considering that you promised to ‘repair’ Facebook early this year, I hope this representative It’s your own.”

At the same time, the major privacy protection regulators and parliamentary committees in the United States are also paying close attention to this issue. Facebook will provide briefings to the six parliaments on Tuesday and Wednesday. Facebook will meet with the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate Judicial Committee, as well as the Commercial and Intelligence Committees of both houses.

According to sources, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is also investigating whether Facebook violated the terms of a 2011 verdict that the company transferred user data to Cambridge Analytica without the user’s knowledge. The FTC is about to send a letter to Facebook. Affected by this news, Facebook shares continued to fall, continuing Monday’s decline.

The FTC is the main department that oversees the protection of corporate privacy. If Facebook is found to be in violation of the terms of the 2011 verdict, it may face a multi-million dollar fine.

New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman announced on Tuesday that as part of the joint investigation, he has sent a letter to Facebook with the Attorney General of Massachusetts. The Attorney General of Connecticut announced his findings on Monday.

Source: TechRadar