Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg: ‘It’s not a question of if regulation, it’s a question of what type’
Sandberg's comments come a day after CEO Mark Zuckerberg broke his silence on the Cambridge Analytica data scandal in a Facebook post and multiple interviews. The data research firm is accused of improperly gaining access to the personal information of tens of millions of Facebook users. Read More
Should you delete Facebook?
Following the certifiable shitshow at Facebook around revelations that data firm Cambridge Analytica harvested and exploited users' data without their permission, many users declared they were through with the platform. The hashtag #deletefacebook spread rapidly on Twitter (another social network … Read More
Facebook data leak scandal won’t deter advertisers unless two things happen, industry insiders say
Facebook is being rocked by a data leak scandal, but most advertisers are not planning to reduce their spend, according to conversations seven people involved in the advertising and media industry who work with Facebook. Some of these people requested anonymity because they were not authorized … Read More
Boycotting digital monopolies like Facebook is harder than it seems
You may have heard of the #DeleteFacebook campaign, but you, like me, are probably among the vast majority of Facebook's nearly 2 billion users who probably won't actually follow through. CEO Mark Zuckerberg even has the data to prove it, telling The New York Times yesterday that he hasn't seen … …
Deleting Facebook? Here Are the Best Alternatives For What You’ll Miss
By now, you're probably aware of the hurricane tearing its way through Facebook. Over the weekend, both The Guardian and The New York Times published explosive reports about the improper use of data belonging to 50 million Facebook users by Trump campaign-affiliated data firm Cambridge … Read More
Facebook’s Campbell Brown: ‘We’ve Been Caught Flat-Footed’ on Data Scandal
Facebook was blindsided by the user-data scandal that has grabbed the headlines in the past week — and the company has undergone an “awakening” to deal with the crisis, said Campbell Brown, the company's head of news partnerships. “We are in a position now where we have to be judged …
Economic historian Niall Ferguson: It’s hard to see how Facebook’s business model remains intact
Facebook is vulnerable to a user revolt and a government crackdown in the wake of the Cambridge Analytica data scandal, historian and prolific author Niall Ferguson told CNBC on Thursday. "Over a five-year time horizon, it's hard to see that its business model is going to survive intact. Because the … …
Facebook is a mess, but some users can’t afford to delete their accounts
I'm as pissed as anyone about the way that Facebook misused data. I'm a journalist who owns a share in a small, independent media company that has seen ad revenues decline dramatically over the past few years—largely because of competition from Facebook (and Google)—so I have a natural … Read More
A ‘dangerous situation’ at Facebook could get ‘much worse’ if we don’t take ‘immediate steps’
As we process the details unfolding around what truly happened at Cambridge Analytica and Facebook, it becomes increasingly apparent that we have allowed a dangerous situation to develop, but that things could get much worse unless we take immediate steps to address the larger risks associated … Read More
Mark Zuckerberg says he’s ‘fundamentally uncomfortable’ making content decisions for Facebook
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg doesn't want to be the content police. But he might not have a choice. For years, Facebook has argued that it's a platform for all ideas. Outside of obvious ethical violations — child pornography or terrorist propaganda, for example — it doesn't want to take responsibility … …