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Mark Zuckerberg Addresses the Cambridge Analytica Scandal, Says Facebook 'Made Mistakes' in Protecting Data (buzzfeed.com)
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg on Wednesday commented on the massive, deepening data harvesting scandal his company has been embroiled in since last Friday. From a report: "We have a responsibility to protect your data, and if we can't then we don't deserve to serve you. I've been working to understand exactly what happened and how to make sure this doesn't happen again," he said. The scandal -- involving the illicit collection of data from 50 million Facebook users, and its later use by Trump campaign analytics vendor Cambridge Analytica -- has helped chop off nearly $50 billion in value from Facebook's market cap since last Friday, led to calls from US lawmakers for Zuckerberg testify before congress, and raised eyebrows at the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, which is now probing the company. Speaking of things Facebook plans to do to ensure that this mess doesn't repeat itself, Zuckerberg added, "First, we will investigate all apps that had access to large amounts of information before we changed our platform to dramatically reduce data access in 2014, and we will conduct a full audit of any app with suspicious activity. We will ban any developer from our platform that does not agree to a thorough audit. And if we find developers that misused personally identifiable information, we will ban them and tell everyone affected by those apps. That includes people whose data Kogan misused here as well.
"Second, we will restrict developers' data access even further to prevent other kinds of abuse. For example, we will remove developers' access to your data if you haven't used their app in 3 months. We will reduce the data you give an app when you sign in -- to only your name, profile photo, and email address. We'll require developers to not only get approval but also sign a contract in order to ask anyone for access to their posts or other private data. And we'll have more changes to share in the next few days."
There is no explicit apology in Zuckerberg's comment today.
"Second, we will restrict developers' data access even further to prevent other kinds of abuse. For example, we will remove developers' access to your data if you haven't used their app in 3 months. We will reduce the data you give an app when you sign in -- to only your name, profile photo, and email address. We'll require developers to not only get approval but also sign a contract in order to ask anyone for access to their posts or other private data. And we'll have more changes to share in the next few days."
There is no explicit apology in Zuckerberg's comment today.
Facebook's business model is predicated on this data collection and selling to whomever is willing to pay.
Of course they will. After all, their primary concern is the users, not the stockholders.
we don't deserve to serve you
... That's all I needed to hear, and I couldn't agree more.
Which has more power: the hammer, or the anvil?
thoughts and prayers, FB, thoughts and prayers
....he doesn't tell anyone on how they will let liberal/socialist companies/groups continue to access that data....since they're in bed together!
Facebook also dragged down the rest of the stock market Since its illegal to hire foreign nationals to run your campaign, not to mention the rest, looks like we are really in store for some serious #winning.
It's so much bullshit, because it is a damage-control response to the CA issue only.
The problem -- of which they are deeply and keenly aware -- is MUCH larger than just CA, and has existed this way, intentionally, for YEARS.
This is a farcical non-response, though some of the measures they are now forced to take will indeed partially address the broader issues.
Why are outside "app" vendors being essentially handed lists of emails? Unfortunate that this will continue, even after the changes -- this is bad practice and promotes spam if nothing else.
Obviously, the fact that Cambridge Analytica was linked to Facebook was a grand mistake on their part. There shouldn't had been any connections to Facebook.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
and neither should anybody else.
your shit still stinks.
compares the firm's alleged Facebook intrusion to burglars who set out to rob a vault full of diamonds and end up hauling home a bag full of worthless cubic zirconia
It's all cubic zirconia. Despite the privacy snowflake flurry, your individual preference and opinion data is worth less than the postage on junk mail.
"And if we find developers that misused personally identifiable information, we will ban them and tell everyone affected by those apps."
The official Facebook app doesn't count.
sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f(q{sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f});
So have I got this right.
Obama scrapes Facebook data for two elections = okidoki
Trump may have used Facebook data = SJW fainting scandal.
https://www.fastcompany.com/40...
46137
... on the hands of those who use Facebook at all.
You think, genius?
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Why is congress jumping all over Zuck's shit when they don't seem to give even the slightest fuck about the data breach that affected anyone using any form of credit in the country? Facebook data-breaches only affect those that already have the mental illness that made them sign up for Facebook. Who cares?
Isn't privacy and Facebook a sort of a odd combination? After all it's free to use, and in return Facebook tries its best to find ways to make money. Frankly I don't believe for a second that Facebook doesn't know this stuff goes on. I also do not believe Zuckerberg has any motivation to do anything about this. Zuckerberg is a college dropout who had a ideal that managed to link people and that was good, until he sold out to everyone to make money off it.
Gee, does that surprise you? They are being investigated by the FTC and who only knows how many private practice lawyers looking for a pay day on this one.
It would be stupid for him to apologize or offer any sort of statement that could be construed as culpability.
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For example, we will remove developers' access to your data if you haven't used their app in 3 months.
In order to protect your privacy Facebook recommends that you change your name, date of birth and social circle at least once a quarter.
Translated ...
"We didn't mean for our longstanding creepy privacy destruction policies to benefit a Republican rather than a Democrat this election cycle, and we promise it won't happen again"
From all I've read about Mr. Zuckerberg, he is a sociopath, someone who cannot understand how his actions cause hurt to other people. As long as he and his little circle of people are taken care of, that's all that matters to him. To him, it's otherwise all just business. Hit him where he lives in order to wake him up to the fact that he has taken on a great responsibility. A moral responsibility to the entire human race. Either he takes his responsibility correctly, as a good human should do and fix the mistakes, or else live with the person he has to face every morning when he has to wash his face. It's his choice.
FB is nothing but a media company, with a news feed that resembles live TV, albeit personalized and "customisable" to an extent.
In any publicly listed for profit media corp the tussle will be between the editorial department which wants full control on content vs marketing / sales which needs sales from selling space. FB has no editorial department, its the users for most part and algos, but marketing / sales is where FB earns its valuation and profile.
What do marketing/sales do? Sell space on news feed, and sell user data.
I feel FB will be profitable even if it stops selling user data. But then almighty greed.
The only plus for current fiasco..."FB boy for POTUS" is DOA.
Tat Tvam Asi
Social media is a system by which idiot will pay(with their time) to give their personal information to a company which(like all companies) main goal is to make their stockholders some money. Knowledge is power.
If he were being honest, it's my guess that he would list the mistakes as;
1. Not being paid enough for the data, and
2. Getting caught.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Facefarm wants to prevent third party apps from profiting off of data that they could be harvesting, getting rid of the competition. There's literally no mention on what Facefarm is going to do to limit THEIR data collection as well. So, it's monopolizing under the umbrella of the outcry from idiots dumb enough to use Facefarm anyway. Clever.
If someone wants to contact you on facebook, they have to make a friend request. They can't give you their email address for you to contact. Facebook gave the email addresses of all the evangelicals to ANALitica, who were pestered with millions of emails telling them Trump would bring on the second coming of Christ. That's why he was elected.
No, Mark the REAL mistake is that you kept your mouth SHUT ...
IF Facebook would have been honest and open about this in 2015, Cambridge Analytica would have probably found it harder to do its shady manipulations of the 2016 elections.
Thanks a lot for Trump, Mark !
When you have a billion dollars, you have no excuse for not understanding the harm you product can cause. If your product is a car, you're on the hook for failed airbags, or whatever negligent harm your product causes. In the case of THIS SITE, that harm is towards civil society and democracy itself.
How do you measure that level of damage and liability? And what is the adequate response to what is either epic negligence, or a shadowy sell-out? In either case damage has been done and someone owes us a lot more than a privacy policy change.
No, Facebook did not make any mistakes, because Facebook is a faceless abstraction. People at Facebook made mistakes (or more likely, knew exactly what they were doing and how much money it would make them). So who exactly were those people, Mark?
Giving a list of actions to be taken is better than an apology. Apologies are mere words and basically meaningless when profits are being still made.
In the Democrat's eyes, "civil damage" is any win by a Republican. Your community was completely opposite this viewpoint when Facebook was letting the Obama campaign datamine its supporters friends' info without their knowledge. Your voice on this is absolutely not credible in the slightest. As such, when you say "Democracy" you really mean the Democratic Party and not the real progress of democracy, which would contain wins by your opponents. Nobody owes you anything.
Really, Zuck??? People have been decrying for years how Facebook's policies were a threat to online privacy. You cannot possibly feign to be caught off-guard by this scandal when it was structurally due for roughly a decade.
They forgot to charge a fee. Gotta make money off your personal data somehow!
The Daily Mail is a perfectly reputable news source for racists, nationalists and Brexit voters Just ask the Daily Mail. It's as unbiased as Fox News, Breitbart and that weird pro-Trump (fake) patriotism TV channel.
Thank you for this "scandal" which will allow us to crack down and more tightly control our customers (through "enhanced auditing") while adding more tiers to our data pricing schedule. Hopefully this PR word soup will give our product the confidence to continue to use Facebook while we work on gaining better control over every transaction we can charge for.
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Facebook/CA creating profiles from data gleaned "below the surface". In any other walk of life, industry, time in history "below the surface" would translate as "surveillance" - when did that become ok? It was abundantly clear what CA were up to in 2015, as outlined here http://www.netopia.eu/the-neve... We need to start paying for things online!
I am neither of those things, not being an American. By seeing this as DEMS vs. GOP you've already put the blinders on, and that's exactly why this is dangerous.