Complete Story
03/21/2018
Facebook Draws Scrutiny From FTC, Congressional Committees
Facebook Inc. is drawing scrutiny from the main U.S. privacy watchdog and half a dozen congressional committees over how the personal data of 50 million users was obtained by a data analytics firm that helped elect President Donald Trump.
Facebook said it would conduct staff-level briefings of six committees Tuesday and Wednesday. That includes meetings with the House and Senate Judiciary Committees, as well as the commerce and intelligence committees of both chambers.
The U.S. Federal Trade Commission is also probing whether Facebook violated terms of a 2011 consent decree over its handling of personal user data that was transferred to Cambridge Analytica without users’ knowledge, according to a person familiar with the matter. The FTC will be sending a letter to the company, another person said. Facebook slumped on the news, extending Monday’s decline.
The FTC is the lead U.S. agency for enforcing companies’ adherence to their own privacy policies and could fine the company into the millions of dollars if it finds Facebook violated a 2011 consent decree. New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman announced on Tuesday that he and Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey had sent a demand letter to Facebook as part of a joint probe stemming from the fallout. Connecticut Attorney General George Jepsen announced his own probe Monday.
Amid the scrutiny, Facebook will be confronting immediate demands by Congress. In addition to the briefings, Senator Mark Warner of Virginia, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said he wants to hear testimony from Facebook Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg, as well as Twitter Inc. CEO Jack Dorsey. Senator Richard Burr of North Carolina, chairman of the Intelligence Committee, said any decision about calling Zuckerberg to appear before the panel is farther off.
