Mark OKs House chat, sued for housing bias
FACEBOOK FOUNDER Mark Zuckerberg has opted in to a grilling by House leaders probing the Cambridge Analytica data breach, a source confirmed to the Daily News.
The billionaire has agreed to testify before the House Energy and Commerce Committee, but many of the details of his in-person visit were still pending Tuesday, the well-placed source on Capitol Hill said Tuesday.
“We are expecting him on April 12,” the source said. “We’re still ironing out the details on timing during the day.”
A spokeswoman for the panel said it was too soon to confirm anything publicly.
“Reports of Mr. Zuckerberg’s confirmed attendance are incorrect. The committee is continuing to work with Facebook to determine a day and time for Mr. Zuckerberg to testify,” Committee spokeswoman Elena Hernandez said in a statement to The News.
In a letter sent to Zuckerberg Friday, Committee Chairman Greg Walden (R-Ore.) and ranking member Frank Pallone Jr. (D-N.J.) said the 33-year-old chairman was indeed the “right person” to answer questions about “disturbing allegations” Facebook failed to stop a third party from improperly “harvesting” the data of 50 million Facebook users and selling it to Trump-linked Cambridge Analytica.
On Monday, the Senate’s Judiciary Committee called on Zuckerberg to appear for testimony April 10.
Zuckerberg has confirmed his company knew way back in 2015 that Cambridge Analytica improperly obtained the treasure trove of private data. He said Facebook quickly demanded the datacrunching firm delete the valuable stash, but his company failed to reach out and warn the affected users.
Facebook publicly announced the breach only after media outlets and a whistleblower revealed Cambridge Analytica not only kept the data but used it to build psychographic profiles of American voters to influence the 2016 election.
The crisis has rocked the social media behemoth to its core, with legions of angry users jumping ship while promoting the popular DeleteFacebook hashtag on other platforms. With Zuckerberg’s congressional testimony looming, Facebook got slapped with a lawsuit claiming the company still helps housing advertisers slam the door on single moms, disabled veterans and other protected classes.
The new complaint from the National Fair Housing Alliance and New York’s Fair Housing Justice Center accuses Facebook of not only breaking a promise to crack down on discriminatory landlords and real estate brokers — but continuing to furnish the tools these advertisers use to exclude large groups of users from seeing their ads.
It claims Facebook’s ongoing actions violate the Fair Housing Act, which makes it illegal to publish rental housing or real estate ads that discriminate based on race, color, national origin, religion, sex, disability or preference on children.
The plaintiffs, including affiliate groups in Florida and Texas, say they conducted investigations in several markets that confirmed their allegations.
“There is absolutely no place for discrimination on Facebook. We believe this lawsuit is without merit, and we will defend ourselves vigorously,” a Facebook spokesperson said in a statement.