Mark Zuckerberg to finally speak out on Cambridge Analytica controversy
Update, 3/21/18, 4:30 p.m.: Zuckerberg made his public statement on Wednesday afternoon.
The boy king will finally address his subjects.
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who has been conspicuously silent about the controversy surrounding Cambridge Analytica, and its reported misuse of Facebook data to help influence the 2016 U.S. election, is planning a public statement about the scandal for Wednesday or early Thursday.
The news was first reported by Axios' Mike Allen, and Facebook confirmed Zuckerberg's plans about speaking within the "next 24 hours" to Mashable. So far neither Zuckerberg nor Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg have spoken out about the scandal, which involved Cambridge Analytica using Facebook tools to harvest the data of approximately 50 million users, mostly without their knowledge or informed consent. While Facebook tightened the way developers gather data years ago, the revelations have led to calls for the public to re-examine its relationship with the social network, which now has over 2 billion users.
Zuckerberg's silence has led to growing questions about just where the hell he is? Publications from Recode to The Atlantic to Quartz have all called for him to make a public statement, and he -- and Sandberg -- were reportedly absent from an internal "emergency" meeting at Facebook held on Tuesday morning that addressed questions from employees.
While Zuckerburg hasn't said a word since the story began to unfold late Friday, other Facebook executives, including VP Andrew Bosworth and Chief Security Officer Alex Stamos -- who is reportedly on his way out from the company -- have addressed the controversy on both Facebook and Twitter. Some of those comments have since been deleted.
Zuckerberg's statement will be aimed at "rebuilding trust." The reason for his delayed response as "that he wanted to say something meaningful rather than just rushing out," and that he was initially focused on "fixing" the problem instead of speaking out about it.
Updated 3/21/18, 9:55 a.m. with Facebook's confirmation of Zuckerberg's planned statement.
Topics Facebook Social Media
Pete Pachal was Mashable’s Tech Editor and had been at the company from 2011 to 2019. He covered the technology industry, from self-driving cars to self-destructing smartphones.Pete has covered consumer technology in print and online for more than a decade. Originally from Edmonton, Canada, Pete first uploaded himself into technology journalism at Sound & Vision magazine in 1999. Pete also served as Technology Editor at Syfy, creating the channel's technology site, DVICE (now Blastr), out of some rusty HTML code and a decompiled coat hanger. He then moved on to PCMag, where he served as the site's News Director.Pete has been featured on Fox News, the Today Show, Bloomberg, CNN, CNBC and CBC.Pete holds degrees in journalism from the University of King's College in Halifax and engineering from the University of Alberta in Edmonton. His favorite Doctor Who monsters are the Cybermen.
