The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
May quizzed over alleged Cambridge Analytica link
Demands from SNP politician to explain Tory association
Theresa May has faced demands to explain alleged Tory links with the firms accused of harvesting personal details from Facebook for electoral gain.
The SNP’s Ian Blackford challenged the Conservative leader at Prime Minister’s Questions on her party’s association with SCL, the parent company of Cambridge Analytica.
Mrs May has told Facebook and CA to fully comply with an investigation by the Information Commissioner into “very concerning” claims about the gathering of personal data.
The London-based data firm CA is accused of using a personality survey application on Facebook to access private details of millions of people, which were then used to target voters in the US presidential election.
Mr Blackford told PMQs the parent firm SCL “has been run by a chairman of Oxford Conservative Association, its founding chairman was a former Conservative MP, a director appears to have donated over £700,000 to the Tory Party, a former Conservative Party treasurer is a shareholder”.
The Prime Minister said that “as far as I am aware” there were no current Government contracts with CA or SCL.
She said the CA allegations are “clearly very concerning”, adding: “I would expect Facebook, Cambridge Analytica and all organisations involved to comply fully with the investigation that is taking place.”
After PMQs, a Downing Street spokesman confirmed the Ministry of Defence had previously had a contract with SCL, but this had ended before the recent allegations came to light.
“We are looking across Government to see if there were any other contracts,” said the spokesman.
“As the Prime Minister said, we are not aware of any other contracts.”
Cambridge Analytica approached the Conservative Party under David Cameron’s leadership with a pitch for work, but this was rejected.
A Tory spokesman said: “The Conservative Party has never employed Cambridge Analytica or its parent company, nor used their services.”
The MoD said it had a contract with SCL Group in 2014-15 but there was no recorded data breach during the contract period, when robust security measures were in place. SCL only held a provisional List X accreditation with the MoD and has not had this accreditation since 2013.
An MoD spokesman said: “We have no current relationship or existing contracts with SCL Group, which includes Cambridge Analytica. As such, the company has no access to any classified information.”
The Prime Minister’s comments came after an academic who developed the app to collect data on millions of Facebook users for CA claimed he has been made a “scapegoat” in the row.
The backlash against Facebook over its handling of personal data has seen calls for users to delete their profiles and wiped billions of dollars off its market value.
Brian Acton, the WhatsApp co-founder who made billions selling the application to Facebook, appeared to add his voice to critics, tweeting “it is time” with the #deletefacebook hashtag.