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Facebook Placed An Employee Who Harvested User Data For Cambridge Analytica On Leave (buzzfeed.com)
Ryan Mac, reporting for BuzzFeed News: A Facebook employee, who helped harvest and sell data from millions of users of the social network for political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica in a previous job, has quietly been placed on administrative leave by the Menlo Park, California-based company. Joseph Chancellor, a quantitative social psychologist for Facebook, has been on leave for a few weeks following revelations of his role in a data privacy scandal that has rocked the Silicon Valley giant, according to two sources familiar with the situation.
In March, it was revealed that Cambridge Analytica, a consulting company that did elections work for Republican presidential candidates Ted Cruz, Ben Carson, and Donald Trump, inappropriately obtained user data from a third-party app developer. That app company, Global Science Research (GSR), was founded by Chancellor and his research partner Aleksandr Kogan, and obtained Facebook user data on up to 87 million people.
In March, it was revealed that Cambridge Analytica, a consulting company that did elections work for Republican presidential candidates Ted Cruz, Ben Carson, and Donald Trump, inappropriately obtained user data from a third-party app developer. That app company, Global Science Research (GSR), was founded by Chancellor and his research partner Aleksandr Kogan, and obtained Facebook user data on up to 87 million people.
Just like they found the one (and only one) using their Facebook admin access to stalk women. Problem solved!
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
Facebook is STILL COLLECTING AND HARVESTING this data.
They promise that "non-permitted parties" will no longer be able to do this. But that doesn't mean that they've stopped doing this analysis nor that they will GIVE PERMISSION to companies/countries as they deem fit.
It is a difference if Facebook, the company, does something with the data, they think you signed/agreed to for them to use, or if an employee is spying in your data and uses it for his own profit.
The first one is arguable legal, the later one is definitely illegal.
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
The fact that they employ a "quantitative social psychologist" speaks volumes about the company. Suddenly the claim that their business model is merely to "sell ads" seems suspect.
Which has more power: the hammer, or the anvil?