Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg added to D.C. privacy lawsuit
Source: Washington Post
The attorney general for the District of Columbia plans has added Facebook chief Mark Zuckerberg to a lawsuit stemming from the Cambridge Analytica scandal, one of the first times the tech scion has personally been targeted by regulators. Back in 2018, Attorney General Karl A. Racine sued the social media giant on accusations of unfair and deceptive trade practices under the Districts Consumer Protection Procedures Act.
Under the CPPA, individuals are liable for the actions of a company if they were aware of them at the time. But after reviewing hundreds of thousands of pages of internal documents and interviewing former employees and others, it became evident that Zuckerberg knowingly and actively participated in each decision leading up to Cambridge Analyticas mass collection of user data and misrepresented how secure that data was, Racine said Wednesday in a statement.
Zuckerberg was aware that Facebooks success hinged on assuring users their data was protected, while selling access to that data without driving people away, the complaint states. The decision to open Facebook to third parties was Zuckerbergs brainchild.
The evidence further demonstrates that Mr. Zuckerberg also participated in misleading the public and government officials about Facebooks role, Racine said. Under these circumstances, Mr. Zuckerberg should be held liable for his involvement in the decisions that enabled the exposure of millions of users data.
Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/10/20/mark-zuckerberg-lawsuit-racine/