FACEBOOK founder Mark Zuckerberg has tried to allay MEPs’ fears about the social media platform’s security following the scandal over Cambridge Analytica, the data analysis firm linked to Donald Trump’s election campaign.
Speaking to a European Parliament meeting in Brussels, Zuckerberg apologised for Facebook’s handling of the affair, while highlighting positives such as the company’s safety check tool, which has been used by tens of thousands of people to assure their loved ones they were safe, for example after terrorist attacks.
But he also admitted there had been mistakes. Zuckerberg said: “We’ve always focused on all the good that connecting people and technology can bring and as Facebook has grown it has helped give people everywhere around the world new tools to stay connected to the people they care about most.
“After the recent terrorist attacks in Berlin, Paris, London and here in Brussels tens of thousands of people used our safety check tool to tell the people they love that they were safe.
“Refugees arriving in Europe are using Facebook to stay in touch with their loved ones back home and find new communities here.
“But it’s also clear that we haven’t done enough to prevent those tools being misused ... whether it’s fake news, foreign interference in elections or developers misusing people’s information, we didn’t take a broad enough view of our responsibilities. That was a mistake and I’m sorry.”
The Parliament’s president, Antonio Tajani, stressed the value of data to companies that were prepared to pay large amounts of money for it.
He said. “Democracy should never become a marketing operation where anyone who buys our data can buy political advantage.
“Many people feel that fake news is a threat to democracy. That’s why we want the major digital companies to respect the rules for the harvesting and use of our data.
“In a few days the General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) will enter into force. This is a very advanced regulation which will prevent abuse of personal data.
“Today’s meeting is just a starting point. We are the regulators and at the conclusion of the hearing the Parliament will be pointing out solutions that digital platforms should adopt to ensure that future elections should be free from manipulation.”
Zuckerberg said: “We’ve always shared these values… and now, we’re going even further to comply with these strong new rules. We’re making the same controls and settings available to people from around the world.”
As at previous hearings in the US, Zuckerberg stressed the company was doubling the number of people working on security and said it would “significantly impact our profitability – but keeping people safe will always be more important than our profits”.
He admitted: “In 2016, we were too slow to identify Russian interference on Facebook in the US presidential election. At the time we were more focused on traditional cyberattacks.
“Since then, we’ve made significant investments to make this sort of attack harder to do on Facebook. We’ve done a better job since 2016, including in the French elections, the German elections, and the Alabama special election.”
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