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Facebook's Sloppy Data-Sharing Deals Might Be Criminal

In the past nine days, Facebook has said it is rethinking its business and a presidential candidate said it should be broken up.

In the past 24 hours, the companys services, including Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Messenger, and Oculus, froze for most of a day and a newspaper revealed that a new crop of prosecutors is investigating the company for criminal behavior related to a slew of data partnerships.

For the past 15 years, Mark Zuckerberg has pushed Facebook to be the most innovative, influential, fast-growing, and profitable company in the worldto move fast and break things.

The new investigation, by federal prosecutors in the Eastern District of New York, is related to deals with more than 150 partners, including many big tech companies.

The company is under investigation by the Federal Trade Commission for its role in the Cambridge Analytica scandal, which burst into public view a year ago Sunday. Cambridge Analytica also sparked a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation and a criminal investigation by prosecutors from the Northern District of California.

The FTC is widely expected to levy its largest-ever fine against Facebook in the coming weeks, perhaps in the billions of dollars.

In response to the Times report of the latest criminal probe, a Facebook spokesperson said, It has already been reported that there are ongoing federal investigations, including by the Department of Justice.

The smartphone revolution, the app economy, and the explosion in peoples desire to share information has made some data arrangements between companies almost a requirement, and Facebook is not the only company to have them.

The horrific act has put Facebook under immense pressure to do something, but can the company prevent broadcasting acts of violence without fundamentally changing the purpose of the social media platform.

Original article
Author: Wired

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