On April 11, 2018, Mark Zuckerberg Chairman
and Chief Executive Officer, Facebook gave his testimony before the
united states house of representatives committee on energy and commerce in the matter of recent Data Leaks via
Facebook.
He started with emotional
appeal “Facebook is an idealistic and optimistic company. For most of our
existence, we focused on all the good that connecting people can bring. As
Facebook has grown, people everywhere have gotten a powerful new tool to stay
connected to the people they love, make their voices heard, and build
communities and businesses.”
Thereafter he referred to the
#metoo movement and the March for Our Lives, campaigns organized with the use
of FB platform. He also referred that After Hurricane Harvey; people raised
more than $20 million for relief through FB platform use only. And reiterated
that more than 70 million small businesses now use Facebook to grow and create
jobs.
His entire approach in his
opening remarks was that Facebook is very sanctimonious and innocent company
created for betterment of humanity and for charity only and does not have any
commercial or other intention rather than serving the mankind with spread of
love amongst the citizen of globe.
Then he acknowledges his guilt
in very carefully drafted words which reads as, “But it’s clear now that we
didn’t do enough to prevent these tools from being used for harm as well. That
goes for fake news, foreign interference in elections, and hate speech, as well
as developers and data privacy. We didn’t take a broad enough view of our
responsibility, and that was a big mistake. It was my mistake, and I’m sorry. I
started Facebook, I run it, and I’m responsible for what happens here.”
Now with these meticulously
crafted words Mr. Zuckerberg wants to convey the message that he never thought
about use of this tool or weapon for harm as well!!!!! In my views very
ridiculous and bizarre statement!!!!! As per information available in public
domain, the entire project of Facebook was with intention to spy on others and
gather the sensitive personal information of the users who will use this
application and very basis of formation of this application is having element
of mens rea in it. So when the foundation and conception of any project is laid
on wrong principles footings, how can anyone expect that users should practise
the ethics while using the same unethical application?
As he acknowledged that we
didn’t take a broad view clarifies that FB was expecting such things to happen
more repeatedly in future but neglected for some undisclosed reasons. I guess
FB was looking only to mint money by sale/compromise of Data and therefore
deliberately kept mum about the scam though it knew it well in advance and way
back in 2014. For this count FB should not be pardoned.
And again FB makes same mistake
by stating that, “Across the board, we have a responsibility to not just build
tools, but to make sure those tools are used for good.”
When these tools are used by
maximum digitally illiterate peoples and also be cyber criminals who are
forever present with new traps and there are few state actors who openly extend
their support to such activities, FB is expecting that these tools to be used
for good only. Initially Mr. Zuckerberg blamed himself for idealistic approach
and isn’t he committing same mistake again by expecting users to make use of
tools for good only?
A weapon is weapon, it can make
or break lives of many innocent people and ultimately it depends upon the
person who holds the same. An AK-47 held by Military officer and held by a
terrorist will certainly have different approaches and results. Creator of
weapon can’t determine who would use the same once it is available for
commercial sell. This appeal seems to be very wishful thinking on part of Mr.
Zuckerberg and he has laid a trap of emotionally exploiting sentiments of
people by maintaining that our intentions were very clear and transparent and
our innocence was exploited by few wrong people whereby such Data leak has
occurred.
Then he speaks about Cambridge
Analytica episode. “Your calendar should be able to show your friends’
birthdays, your maps should show where your friends live, and your address book
should show their pictures” was the only purpose for introducing this app
called Facebook in 2007 by Mr. Zuckerberg. And he expects people world over to
believe him.
In 2013 Kogan has introduced
Personality Development app on Facebook and in 2014 FB realised that what
additional information Kogan’s app is collecting from the Facebook and
therefore changed the entire platform to dramatically limit the Facebook information,
which third party apps could access. Most importantly, apps like Kogan’s could
no longer ask for information about a person’s friends unless their friends had
also authorized the app. FB also required developers to get approval from
Facebook before they could request any data beyond a user’s public profile,
friend list, and email address.
So it is well evident that in
2014 FB was knowing what and how much information is available with the third
party apps and it may be concluded that there would be hundred’s of such apps
which would have compromised with almost all the sensitive personal information
of all the Facebook users. But still FB maintained its silence over the data
compromise. Mr. Zuckerberg needs to answer why FB remained silent for 4 long years
when it very well knew about the scam. Was it because of some financial gain FB
was also making by allowing such hundreds of apps or was genuinely innocent?
In 2015 FB has learnt about
Data breach but remains tight-lipped about the same and only act from its side
was demanding Forensic certification of data deletion. Why FB didn’t initiate
legal action for such huge crime called as Breach of Confidentiality and
Privacy of the People’s Sensitive personal Data? US have been very vocal
globally about Basic fundamental rights infringements and one of its wealthiest
businessmen keeps mum over the said infringements? Does infringement of Right
to Privacy does not warrant any judicial intervention as per FB policies?
There are many such questions
which originate from this Cambridge Analytica episode and needs answer from Mr.
Zuckerberg.
Then Mr. Zuckerberg explains
about Russians involvement by use of coordinated networks of fake accounts to
interfere in the US election by promoting or attacking specific candidates and
causes, creating distrust in political institutions, or simply spreading
confusion. Some of these activities used FB ads tools and thereby providing huge
cash inflow to FB coffers. FB estimate
is that approximately 126 million people may have been served with the fake or
targeted content during such election period. FB also acknowledged the role it
played in France as well as German presidential elections in 2017 by deleting
fake FB accounts. So its well known secret that social media is used world over
to influence election voters and FB is still in learning mode regarding how to
handle the same.
Again at end of his statement
he emotionally appeals, “I’ve directed our teams to invest so much in security—
on top of the other investments we’re making— that it will significantly impact
our profitability going forward. But I want to be clear about what our priority
is: protecting our community is more important than maximizing our profits.”
So here again he makes us to
believe that he is ready to compromise with profit margins at the cost of
people’s data safety and expects people world over to fall in trap and don’t
leave his platform.
The appeal is full of emotions
and promises that FB reiterates for customer retention and this shows how much
panicky FB is right now. The CA episode has entirely eroded the credibility
social media has earned so far, though apparent. There is steep fall in FB
shares prices recently and once more panic triggers are pressed like enquiries
by various States regarding the Data breach episode , we may witness another
Dotcom Bubble bursting.
I personally does not wish this
to happen as once we have moved so far on digital path that its practically
impossible to return back and if this happens more chaos will prevent on
information superhighway leading to more accidents and tragedies.
What I wish is a State
reasonably regulated, monitored Social media used by digitally literate netizens
and free of any State control. The uses must undergo some basic digital
literacy training so as to understand do’s and Don’ts on social media.
Hope the day is not too far.
Adv. Mahendra Limaye
