Stock up on the popcorn — the currently suspended CEO of the firm at the center of a data handling and political ad-targeting storm currently embroiling Facebook, Cambridge Analytica, has been recalled by a UK parliamentary committee that’s running a probe into the impact of fake news b…
Stock up on the popcorn — the currently suspended CEO of the firm at the center of a data handling and political ad-targeting storm currently embroiling Facebook, Cambridge Analytica, has been recalled by a UK parliamentary committee that’s running a probe into the impact of fake news because it’s unhappy with the quality of his prior answers.
The committee also says it has fresh questions for Alexander Nix in light of revelations that hit the headlines at the weekend about how a researcher’s app was used to gather personal information on about 270,000 Facebookers and 50 million of their friends, back in 2015 — data that was passed to CA in violation of Facebook’s policies.
Nix gave evidence to the DCMS committee on February 27, when he claimed: “We do not work with Facebook data, and we do not have Facebook data. We do use Facebook as a platform to advertise, as do all brands and most agencies, or all agencies, I should say. We use Facebook as a means to gather data. We roll out surveys on Facebook that the public can engage with if they elect to.”
That line is one of the claims the committee says it’s keen to press him on now. In a letter to Nix, it writes: “[T]here are a number of inconsistencies in your evidence to us of 27 February, notably your denial that your company received data from the Global Science Research company [aka the firm behind the survey app used by CA to harvest data on 50M Facebook users, according to The Observer].”
“We are also interested in asking you again about your claim that you “do not work with Facebook data, and […] do not have Facebook data,” it continues, warning: “Giving false statements to a Select Committee is a very serious matter.”
The self-styled ‘not a political consultancy’ but “technology-driven marketing firm” (and sometime “campaign consultancy and communication services” company) — which Nix also described in his last evidence session as “not a data miner… a data analytics company” — had its Facebook account suspended late last week for violating Facebook’s platform policies.
While Nix was suspended as CEO by CA’s board on Tuesday, following a Channel 4 News report aired a series of secret recordings that appeared to show Nix advocating the use of proxy organisations to feed untraceable messages onto social media to influence voters. The recordings were made by an undercover reporter posing as a potential client.
The UK’s data protection watchdog, the ICO, has also applied for a warrant to gain access to CA’s offices and servers — accusing the company of failing to hand over information the regulator had requested as part of a wider investigation it’s carrying out into the use of data analytics for political purposes.
CA is also now facing several legal challenges from Facebook users angry about how their data appears to have been misused .
We reached out to the company for comment on the DCMS recall. At the time of writing it had not responded.
Below are a few choice segments from Nix’s last evidence session in from of the committee — which we expect he will be asked to revisit should he agree to make a repeat appearance…
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