Facebook
Facebook
said Monday it has suspended “around 200” apps on its
platform as part of an investigation into misuse of private user
data.The investigation was launched after revelations that political
consulting firm Cambridge Analytica hijacked data on some 87 million
Facebook users as it worked on Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign.
“The investigation process is in full swing,”
said
an online
statement from Facebook product partnerships vice president Ime
Archibong.“We have large teams of internal and external experts working
hard to
investigate these apps as quickly as possible. To date thousands of
apps have been investigated and around 200 have been suspended — pending
a thorough investigation into whether they did in fact misuse any
data.”Archibong added that “where we find evidence that these or other
apps
did misuse data, we will ban them and notify people via this
website.”The revelations over Cambridge Analytica have prompted
investigations
on both sides of the Atlantic and led Facebook to tighten its policies
on how personal data is shared and accessed.Facebook made a policy
change in 2014 limiting access to user data
but noted that some applications still had data obtained prior to the
revision.“There is a lot more work to be done to find all the apps that
may
have misused people’s Facebook data — and it will take time,”
Archibong
said.Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg spent most of the past
month
on the fallout from revelations about Cambridge Analytica’s data
hijacking, seeking to assuage fears that the California-based internet
colossus can safeguard privacy while making money by targeting ads based
on what people share about themselves.Efforts to rebuild trust in
Facebook include a review of all applications that had access to large
amounts of user data.The 200 applications Facebook said it suspended
included one called
myersonality that collected psychological information shared by
millions of members of the social network who voluntarily took
“psychometric” tests.“We suspended the my Personality app almost a month
ago because we
believe that it may have violated Facebook’s policies,” Archibong said
Monday in response to an AFP inquiry.
“We are currently
investigating the app, and if my Personality refuses to cooperate or
fails our audit, we will ban it.”About 40 percent of the people who took
the tests also opted to share
Facebook profile data, resulting in a large science research database,
the University of Cambridge psychometrics center said of the project on
its website.Security and encryption at the website used to share data
with
registered academic collaborators was meager and easily bypassed,
according to a report Monday in British magazine New Scientist.
Source: GNP
No comments:
Post a Comment