By ALLIE SIMON
After tens of millions of people have had their Facebook data harvested and exploited by Cambridge Analytics, a data analytics firm with ties to President Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, Facebook is attempting to redeem its reputation. Starting this past Monday, Facebook has begun adding a “see how you’re affected” tool to the top of affected user’s homepages.
The information was compiled after Facebook users granted a psychological questionnaire, hosted by a website called “This is your life,” access to their Facebook before completing the survey, according to CNN. The data, including location, friend’s information, and things user’s liked, was then sent to Cambridge Analytics.
According to The New York Times, Cambridge Analytics used the collected data to “help build tools that it claimed could identify the personalities of American voters and influence their behavior.” The firm obtained the data before 2015, but was hired by Trump’s campaign in 2016.
Records obtained by The New York Times say that about 300,000 people took the survey, but because the survey allowed access to user’s friends information, an estimated 87 million people have been potentially affected.
The new tool that is appearing atop affected user’s homepage is headlined “Protecting your information.” The users see a message explaining that some of their data was misused when Facebook shared it with Cambridge Analytics.
According to CNBC, the ex-CEO of Cambridge Analytics, Alexander Nix, was caught on camera saying that the firm ran all operations for Trump’s campaign. Despite this, Cambridge Analytics is denying any accusations.
Affected users will see a message at the top of their homepage addressing the breach.
Millions of users are appalled by the scandal and have even started a #DeleteFacebook movement. They want to voice their anger about their lack of privacy on the widely-used platform.
Christopher Deason, who owns his own computer business, said, “If I were just working my 9-to-5 at the local bank or whatever, and coming home and getting on Facebook to check on my friends and whatnot, yeah, I would delete Facebook.”
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg will testify in front of Congress on Wednesday, April 9.