London | Britain’s information regulator on Wednesday said that it intends to fine Facebook for data protection law breach.
Britain has earlier ordered an investigation on how millions of users’ data was improperly accessed by consultancy Cambridge Analytica.
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg was recently questioned by U.S. and EU lawmakers over how Cambridge Analytica improperly got hold of the personal data of 87 million Facebook users from a researcher.
Britain’s Information Commissioner Elizabeth Denham while updating on her investigation into the use of data analytics by political campaigns, said she intended to fine Facebook 500,000 pounds, a small figure for a company with a market value of $590 billion, but the maximum amount allowed.
“Facebook had broken the law by failing to safeguard people’s information and had not been transparent about how data was harvested by others on its platform,” she added
In a released statement Elizabeth Denham said, “New technologies that use data analytics to micro-target people give campaign groups the ability to connect with individual voters. But this cannot be at the expense of transparency, fairness and compliance with the law.”
“As we have said before, we should have done more to investigate claims about Cambridge Analytica and take action in 2015,” Erin Egan, Facebook’s Chief Privacy Officer, statement added.
“We have been working closely with the Information Commissioner’s Office in their investigation of Cambridge Analytica, just as we have with authorities in the US and other countries.”
British lawmakers had launched an inquiry into “fake news” and its effect on election campaigns, and have increasingly focused on Cambridge Analytica.
Cambridge Analytica has earlier said that while it pitched for work with campaign group Leave.EU ahead of the Brexit referendum in Britain in 2016, it did not end up doing any work on the campaign.
However, the Information Commissioner’s report said other regulatory action would include a criminal prosecution against Cambridge Analytica’s parent firm, SCL Elections, for failing to deal with the regulator’s enforcement notice.
Information Commissioner said it also would send warning letters to 11 political parties to compel them to audit their data protection practices.
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