Facebbok article

By Language Lab LangLab

​1. In 2015, Cambridge Analytica, a voter analytics group, accessed the private data of 87 million Facebook users. They bought the information from a psychology professor from the University of Cambridge. Professor Aleksandr Kogan had used an app called "This Is Your Digital Life" to collect data from Facebook users' locations, likes, and sometimes even private messages. At the time, data collection by third party apps was not illegal under Facebook's policies. However, when the professor sold the information to Cambridge Analytica, this became a severe privacy breach. Cambridge Analytica worked for Donald Trump's presidential campaign.

​2. Facebook learned of this privacy breach in 2015 but did not notify its affected users at the time. Instead, Facebook took down the app and told Cambridge Analytica to delete any user information it had. The company agreed to do this, but they used the information to help the Trump campaign instead.

​3. In March 2018, the public became aware of Facebook's worst privacy scandal in history when a Canadian whistle-blower, who had previously worked for Cambridge Analytica, shared his story with The Guardian. When the story broke, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who usually tries to stay out of the limelight, had to face the backlash of millions of Facebook users. The CEO quickly admitted to his company's mistake and said it had updated its policies to prevent this from happening again.

​4. Zuckerberg's apology was not enough for US lawmakers. In April 2018, the CEO was asked to testify before the US Senate on the subject of privacy. While in the hot seat, Zuckerberg admitted to mistakes but defended his company, saying that it started in his dorm room and was never expected to grow as quickly as it did.

​ 5. During the Senate hearings, Zuckerberg said he would consider a new policy requiring Facebook to notify users within 72 hours of a privacy breach. He also agreed that a law requiring tech companies to get permission before reusing user's data would be a good idea. When asked if he thought his company should be regulated, Zuckerberg said yes, if Facebook was treated as a tech company rather than a media company.

​ 6. Despite this scandal, Zuckerberg did not agree to change user privacy settings to “strict by default.”
He did, however, promise to cooperate with the Senate on future online privacy improvements. Facebook also provided a tool so users could check if their data was involved in the Cambridge Analytica breach.