CEO of Facebook mark Zuckerberg acknowledged that the regulation of social media companies is “inevitable” and said that his personal data was stolen through malicious outsiders. But after two days of hearings in Congress that seemed clear was how little the Congress, it seems, knows about Facebook, much less what to do with it.
House lawmakers aggressively questioned Zuckerberg on Wednesday at the users ‘ data, privacy settings and whether the company has a bias against conservatives. As they did in the Senate a day earlier, both Republicans and Democrats have suggested that the ruling may be needed, but there was no consensus and few specifics about what that might look like — or even what the biggest problems.
New Jersey Frank Pallone Rep., the top Democrat on the panel and a 30-year veteran of the house said at the beginning of the hearing that he plans to work on legislation, but pessimistic that Congress will pass anything.
“I just saw it again and again — what we are hearing and nothing is happening,” he said.
For Zuckerberg, who was often explaining what his company does in primitive conditions legislators twice his age, hearing can be considered a victory: shares of Facebook rose after growth of 4.5% on Monday more than 1 percent. And his company returned more than $25 billion of market value that is lost as it was revealed in March that the Cambridge data Analytics and mining firm affiliated with Donald trump in the presidential campaign, gathered personal information from 87 million users, to try to affect the election results.
Still, shares of Facebook still remains 10% below where it stood before the scandal, and this decline has erased from the face of the earth about $ 50 billion in shareholder wealth.
Zuckerberg agreed to a hearing with increasing pressure over the scandal of the Cambridge analyst and his own admission of the company last year that it was compromised of Russians trying to influence the 2016 elections. Earlier this year, the special adviser Robert Mueller for 13 Russian individuals and three Russian companies in the plot to intervene in the presidential election of 2016 through social media and outreach efforts, which included purchases in the online ad using the alias USA and politicking in the USA. A number of Russian ads on Facebook.
Zuckerberg said in the Senate on Tuesday that the company is working with Mueller in his probe of Russia and apologized again and again for the appeal of the company to data privacy.
“I started Facebook, I run it and I am responsible for what happens here,” he said.
House lawmakers were a little harder to Zuckerberg than their counterparts in the Senate, many of whom seemed confused about the company and what it does. Some of the members of the house briefly interrupted him for questioning, trying to make the most of his four minutes each.
Zuckerberg mostly held his composure, repeating many of the same well-rehearsed answers, he asks forgiveness for the mistakes of the company. It works on artificial intelligence technology to weed out hate and at the same time to ensure that they do not block people for the wrong reasons. People with their own data, how he sees it. And he’s come a long way since he created the platform in his Dorm room nearly 15 years ago.
Some deputies said Zuckerberg, 33, as they will their children or grandchildren, and sometimes confuse difficulties associated with his company.
Surrounding him four minutes, Resp. Gus Bilirakis, R-FLA., praised the platform, saying, “it’s wonderful for us seniors to connect with our relatives.”
To the closure of a hearing on Wednesday, Zuckerberg spent about 10 of the previous 24 hours to testify before Congress.
According to the rules, Zuckerberg stated that he is open to it.
“The Internet is becoming increasingly important worldwide in the lives of people, and I think it is inevitable that there must be some rules,” he said.
Still, he said, lawmakers have to be careful, noting that new rules or laws could harm small businesses more than a Behemoth like Facebook.
The Chairman of the energy and Commerce chamber Greg Walden says the Committee will see what can be done.
“While Facebook has certainly grown up, I worry that he is not ripe” Walden, R-ore, said Zuckerberg. “I think it’s time to ask whether Facebook may have gone too fast and too many things broken”.
Many of the questions directed to the Cambridge analyst who gathered the data a few years ago through a personality quiz created by a scientist-researcher. App to propylesosit not only the data of people who have taken it, but also because of the loose restrictions of Facebook data from friends, too, including items that they are not intended for publication. And then in Cambridge the analyst obtained data and was said to have used it to try to influence elections all over the world.
Zuckerberg said that the house he heard his own data Facebook was part of this trajectory. He said in the Senate that Facebook was made to believe the Cambridge analyst deleted user data it collected and what was “clearly a mistake”. He assured the senators that the company will be processed today, the situation is different.
This may be enough to satisfy lawmakers now. But that could change if Democrats take control of Congress in the midterm elections this year.
Pallone said that if the Democrats were in power, “then we would like to push more”.
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Ortutay reported from new York. Associated Press writers Ryan Nakashima, Richard Lardner and Lisa Mascaro contributed to this report.
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For full coverage of the privacy scandal Facebook, visit https://apnews.com/tag/FacebookPrivacyScandal
Sourse: abcnews.go.com
