Questions mount for Facebook — and Mark Zuckerberg isn't answering them
A data mining firm’s alleged misuse of Facebook user data is ballooning into one of the highestprofile crises that the social media giant has ever faced. Yet Facebook’s highest-profile executives have so far been noticeably absent from the conversation.
Since Cambridge Analytica was accused this weekend of misappropriating data linked to 50 million accounts in an attempt to sway users’ political opinions, Facebook has faced questions from Congress and the Federal Trade Commission and has seen its stock price drop by around 10 percent.
But the company’s chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, and chief operating officer, Sheryl Sandberg, have remained silent. Neither has issued a public statement, and neither addressed employees at a company meeting about the controversy Tuesday.
In their place, high-ranking managers with much less name recognition have taken to Twitter to defend the company with mixed results.
It’s a tactic that Eden Gillott Bowe, president of crisis management firm Gillott Communications, likened to “a really expensive, high-stakes game of chess.”
In times of scandal, it’s not unusual for a company to send out someone with authority to speak about an issue rather than a top executive, Gillot Bowe said. The hope is that lower-ranking staff can quell concerns without risking more valuable pieces.
“If you start bringing in the king and queen, then it sends the message that this is a much bigger story than we thought it was going to be, it elevates the issue, and it creates a whole new news cycle,” she said.
When this practice works, the news cycle moves on and people quickly forget that there was ever an issue to begin with. But if the mounting pressure on Facebook and the company’s falling stock price are anything to go by, the company’s efforts at explaining away the controversy have so far failed to calm regulators and investors.
The day before news broke of Cambridge’s alleged activities, Facebook released a statement, attributed Founder and CEO of Facebook Mark Zuckerberg participates in the APEC CEO Summit on November 19, 2016, in Lima, Peru. A data mining firma s alleged misuse of Facebook user data is ballooning into one of the highest-profile crises that the social media giant has ever faced.
to deputy general counsel Paul Grewal, announcing that it had suspended the data mining firm for violating company guidelines.
Facebook’s head of hardware, Andrew Bosworth, added on Twitter that Facebook was committed to “vigorously enforcing” its policies and “will take whatever steps are required to see that this happens.” A day later, he tweeted to clarify that the violation was not a data breach and on Monday posted on his Facebook page a lengthy explanation of Cambridge Analytica’s violations and the steps he says his company is taking to protect user data.
Alex Stamos, Facebook’s chief security officer, took to Twitter on Sunday to reiterate that Cambridge Analytica’s violation of Facebook guidelines did not constitute a data breach. Hours later, he deleted those tweets, and wrote that he did so “not because they were factually incorrect but because I should have done a better job weighing in.”
He went on: “I’m going to step away from this one. I really care about privacy and security, as well as platform openness, freedom from censorship and stopping authoritarians who use the internet as a weapon. I just wish I was better about talking about these things in the reality of 2018.”
On Tuesday, Stamos was again on Twitter, refuting reports that he plans to leave Facebook because of disagreements with Sandberg over how the social network can halt the spread of misinformation.
Throughout all this, Zuckerberg and Sandberg stayed mum.
Despite being prolific Facebook users, Sandberg’s last post was from Saturday about being at a kids’ debate day, and Zuckerberg’s last post was from March 2, commemorating Passover.
Neither Stamos, Bosworth, nor Facebook responded to a request for comment. It is unclear whether Facebook encouraged or was aware of the employees’ tweets before they were published.
Executive silence after scandal can help or hurt a company, according to crisis management experts. Speaking too soon and claiming too much responsibility can potentially put an executive on the hook when it comes to litigation and depositions.
Dan Hill, the chief executive of communications strategy firm Hill Impact, gave the example of Mary Barra, who became CEO of General Motors around the time it issued safety recalls. After claiming full responsibility for the company’s problems, “she was never able to get away from it,” Hill said.
“She became the centerpiece of it. She was the spokesperson for the company. On the one hand it may look like you’re showing leadership, but if you’re the spokesperson during the crisis, it can also be hugely distracting,” he said.
Zuckerberg might be familiar with the downside of a knee-jerk response. Days after the 2016 presidential election, he dismissed concerns that the dissemination of fake news on social media influenced the outcome of the election, telling an audience at a technology conference that it was a “pretty crazy idea.” A year later, he expressed regret at his comments and admitted that Facebook “played a far bigger role in this election.”
Facebook announced Monday
The Transportation Security Administration said Tuesday that its airport security agents do not scan or review the data held on electronic devices carried by passengers on domestic flights.
The statement came in a letter to the American Civil Liberties Union chapter in San Francisco, which filed a lawsuit last week demanding that the TSA explain its procedures and policies when searching and scanning electronic devices carried on domestic flights.
Despite the denial from the TSA, the ACLU said it continues to demand that the TSA provide documentation to prove the agency is not scanning electronic devices.
“The public deserves all available information about what is and isn’t considered a permissible search by TSA,” said Vasudha Talla, staff attorney with the ACLU Foundation of Northern California.
The ACLU claims in the lawsuit that it suspects the TSA is looking at the data in electronic devices because of media reports and complaints from domestic travelers who say they have had their electronic devices scanned for data by TSA officers.
The TSA has acknowledged that it adopted enhanced screening measures last year that require passengers put digital devices larger than a cellphone in separate bins before undergoing an X-ray scan to ensure the devices do not contain explosives. But the agency insists it doesn’t look at the data inside the devices.
United Airlines is suspending new reservations for pets traveling in the cargo compartment after three dogs were loaded onto wrong planes last week and a fourth died in an overhead bin.
United will honor reservations that have already been confirmed for Petsafe, its program for pets traveling in cargo, the airline said Tuesday. The suspension does not affect pets traveling with their owners in the cabin.
The airline said it would complete the review by May 1.
Chicago-based United diverted a plane to Akron, Ohio, on Thursday after discovering it had mistakenly loaded a dog aboard the flight from Newark, N.J., to St. Louis. Two days earlier, the airline sent a Kansas City, Mo.-bound German shepherd to Japan after switching it with a Great Dane.
All three pets have since been reunited with their owners, and all 33 people aboard the diverted flight were compensated, Schmerin said. The airline declined to estimate the cost of the compensation or the chartered flight that brought the dog home from Japan.
Those mistakes followed the death of a French bulldog that appeared to have suffocated after a flight attendant placed it in an overhead compartment on a threehour flight from Houston to New York City earlier in the week.