All you need to know about the Facebook scandal

Counselors working for President Trump's campaign have been using millions of personal accounts on Facebook. This is the key point the New York Times and The Guardian have noted, as well as comments from Facebook.

All this information indicates that the social network giant was deceived to obtain data from more than 50 million users on Facebook, which was manipulated and used for electoral ads during the Trump campaign in 2016.

So far, everything we heard about Facebook and the election campaign in 2016 was focused on a Russian hand in the matter, but the consulting company in the field of data, "Cambridge Analytica Cambridge Analytica" is a different problem, where it was reported that this company has received data millions of Facebook users In a manner that violates the public Facebook policy.

It also benefited from this data to create an idea of ​​users and friends to direct and direct the election ads. Facebook said it had asked Cambridge Analytics to delete the data but reports that it was not actually done, while the company said in turn that it adheres to the Facebook policy and does not get To the information in a legitimate and legal manner.

What is Cambridge Analytica?

The company is a British data analysis company that helps campaigning to reach voters online. The company collects data from various sources to create user profiles and then uses software to predict voter behavior that can be influenced by targeted advertising.

Cambridge Analytica does not have a small amount of data but has 5000 data points on more than 230 million voters in the United States, a large figure given that 250 million people are eligible to vote in the United States.

What did Cambridge Analytica do?

In a statement on Friday, March 16, Facebook said that Cambridge Analytica obtained user data from a Cambridge University lecturer named Alexander Kogan, who created an application called thisisyourdigitlalife (which is your digital life) About personal users.

This application requires users to sign in with their Facebook accounts, which allows the app to access personal user pages, sites and pages they like on Facebook, and of course their friends' data.

Facebook explained that the problem was that Kogan sent user data to Cambridge Analytics without the permission of users, which violates the laws and laws of Facebook.

What does Trump have to do with this problem?

The Trump ad campaign co-operated with Cambridge Analytica to manage data during the 2016 election. Steve Bannon, who became Trump's main advisor, was vice chairman of Cambridge Analytics. The campaign helped identify and target voters by advertising and gave information about How to deal with them like the place where they should put a stand for the campaign.

Why did Facebook block Cambridge Analytica?

Facebook has said that Cambridge Analytics has confirmed that it has deleted data and information three years ago, as Kogan did, but since then Facebook has received reports that all users' data has not been deleted and Facebook has blocked it.

Has Facebook been hacked?

The New York Times described the incident as a data breach and said it was one of the biggest data breaches in the history of the social network. The way Kogan obtained the information was legal and in line with Facebook's policies, but the problem was that Kogan did not keep this information to himself and transferred it to Cambridge Analytics.

Facebook therefore refuses to view the problem as a data infiltration incident because the method of obtaining information is legal and conducted through natural methods using an application that takes the user's permission to access its information.

What does Facebook do about it?

Five days later, Mark Zuckerberg left his silence on March 21 through a leaflet on his personal page that admitted Facebook had made some mistakes about users and that Facebook had a responsibility to protect their data.

Facebook also began investigating apps that have access to a large amount of information before making changes to how third-party applications access data in 2018. Facebook will conduct a thorough audit of applications with suspicious activity and prevent developers who do not respond to scrutiny.

The company also intends to reduce the amount of developers access to your data and reduce the information that applications give to include only your name, photo and email address.

Have people started to give up Facebook?

There are some prominent figures who have started to stay away from Facebook, although it is too early to tell whether this will have a significant impact. One of the founders of Watanabe Brian Octon has launched #DeleteFacebook on Twitter.

After the campaign announced Mozilla Firefox developer for the suspension of the announcement on Facebook due to concerns of protection, but remains Elon Mask is the most prominent who gave up on Facebook, where he deleted my page Tesla and Spice X from Facebook.

What should you do?

There is not much to do in fact. Even if you do not have the Kogan application, it's possible that your information has been leaked because the application takes advantage of user friend data.