Facebook Faces Congress

Published April 12, 2018 at 10:00 AM CDT

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg takes his seat to testify before a joint hearing of the Commerce and Judiciary Committees on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, April 10, 2018, about the use of Facebook data to target American voters in the 2016 election. (AP Photo, Alex Brandon)

With David Folkenflik

Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg faces the wrath of Congress. We’ll unpack the privacy scandal that has overwhelmed the world’s most popular social media network.

This show airs Thursday at 11 a.m. EST.

Guests:

Mary Bruce, congressional reporter for ABC News who covered the Facebook hearing. ( @marykbruce)

Nicholas Thompson, editor-in-chief of WIRED Magazine. ( @nxthompson)

Edmund Lee, managing editor at Recode. ( @edmundlee)

Dipayan Ghosh, former privacy and public policy adviser at Facebook. ( @ghoshd7)

From The Reading List:

ABC News: Zuckerberg back on Hill for second day of grilling — “Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg returned to Capitol Hill Wednesday for a second day of congressional hearings, as the company grapples with the fallout of the Cambridge Analytica data privacy scandal.”

Recode: This is how Facebook uses your data for ad targeting — “Facebook collects a lot of data about you — everything from your email address to the strength of your phone’s battery.”

WIRED: Congress Is Unearthing Facebook’s Terrible Power — “Toward the beginning of Tuesday’s Congressional hearing, South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham asked Mark Zuckerberg about competition: ‘If I buy a Ford, and it doesn’t work well, and I don’t like it, I can buy a Chevy. If I’m upset with Facebook, what’s the equivalent product that I can go sign up for?'”

WIRED: Mark Zuckerberg Talks To WIRED About Facebook’s Privacy Problem — “(Zuckerberg) gave an interview to WIRED in which he discussed the recent crisis, the mistakes Facebook made, and different models for how the company could be regulated. He also discussed the possibility that another—Russian—shoe could drop.”

WIRED: Inside Facebook’s Two Years Of Hell — “ONE DAY IN late February of 2016, Mark Zuckerberg sent a memo to all of Facebook’s employees to address some troubling behavior in the ranks. His message pertained to some walls at the company’s Menlo Park headquarters where staffers are encouraged to scribble notes and signatures. On at least a couple of occasions, someone had crossed out the words ‘Black Lives Matter’ and replaced them with ‘All Lives Matter.’ Zuckerberg wanted whoever was responsible to cut it out.”

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg testified on Capitol Hill this week for the first time. A social media visionary preaching a gospel of digital connection – facing tough, tough questions over revelations that some 87 million users had their personal data mined by advertisers without their knowledge. Facebook has operated beyond borders – now it’s facing bipartisan calls for federal regulation.

This hour, On Point: Facebook’s future – and ours.

— David Folkenflik