Founder of world’s biggest social media platform apologised to US Congress over Cambridge Analytica scandal
“It was my mistake, and I’m sorry. I started Facebook, I run it, and I’m responsible for what happens here,” Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said while addressing a joint committee hearing of the US Congress on Tuesday, adding that that the company had not done enough to prevent the misuse of user data.
The CEO told lawmakers that the misuse of Facebook data was his mistake, asserting that employees of his company is “working with” Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s probe into Russian meddling in the 2016 US presidential election.
“There are people in Russia whose job it is to try to exploit our systems and other internet systems and other systems as well,” he said. “This is an arms race. They’re going to keep getting better, and we need to invest in getting better at this too.”
The company is facing two federal lawsuits, in California and in Delaware, over its handling of user data.
In March, it was revealed that UK-based political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica had gained access to the personal data of millions of Facebook users without their knowledge. The company used the information to influence the 2016 US presidential election and the 2016 Brexit referendum. On Tuesday, Facebook announced that it has begun notifying some of the some 70.6 million users in the US and around 2.7 million users in the European Union who were affected.
