Social media giant Facebook has announced this week about the privacy changes it would implement. These privacy changes came in after the Cambridge Analytica data scandal. Not just the recent scandal, Facebook is keen to implement changes in the platform due to legislation.
It can be recalled that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg talked about the scandal. He revealed that about 50 million Facebook user profiles’ data were collected and sent to Cambridge Analytica. He also announced that the platform would now include a tool at the top of the News Feed.
Facebook’s new tool allows users to know what apps have been accessing their data. The tool also restricts the developers’ access to data, among others. Earlier this week, Facebook has revealed some measures for its global users. The social media giant disclosed that these measures were a work in progress.
A UK lawmaker named Damian Collins has reportedly summoned the Facebook CEO to appear before the British parliament, CNBC reported on Wednesday.
“A lot of it, a lot of stuff they would need to have done to be compliant with the new European data protection laws, known as GDPR. So I’m not convinced how much of that was actually really new stuff,” Collins told CNBC.
What is General Data Protection Regulation
The inquiry came on the heels of the General Data Protection Regulation that would be implemented across the European Union come May 25. This legislation obliges companies to allow users to download the data that was held on them.
The legislation also allows users to transfer these data to another service if the users opted to. Two salient provisions of GDR also are the right to be forgotten and the right to request data be deleted.
For Ian Bremmer, founder of political analysis firm Eurasia Group, said: “A much tighter data environment from Europe is set to change the way Facebook handles what they collect and how they sell it.”
“And given that Facebook’s 2-plus billion users are tightly interconnected, a change in Europe will affect how they handle business for those users connected to those in Europe as well,” Bremmer as quoted saying in the CNBC report.
“So it’s not quite as challenging for Facebook to say they’re taking the popular outcry seriously and are prepared to address it – that legal ‘fix’ was already in the books,” he added.
