BUSI 1055 Organisations Behaviour
FACEBOOK – CAMBRIDGE ANALYTICA CASE ANALYSIS
Word Count: 1,473 words
, Introduction
Facebook is the biggest social media platform company, which aims to
“connect billions of people around the world” and “bring people closer
together”, according to their website. Facebook operates by collecting and
holding tremendous amounts of its users’ personal information and data,
however recent scandals revealed that millions of user data was breached.
In 2014, Cambridge Analytica has harvested up to 87 million Facebook
user’s personal data for political purposes. Their personal data were used for
psychographic targeting - to generate personality profiles which can be used to
predict and influence their behaviour. In 2015, Facebook found out about their
data breach with Cambridge Analytica, but failed to make any public
statements regarding the incident of how its platform was being used for
political campaigns. The story died, with Facebook still using its data sharing
practices. (Rosenberg, 2018) Three years later, The New York Times and The
Observer published bombshell reports regarding the Facebook and Cambridge
Analytica scandal, finally getting the public’s attention in 2018.
Facebook was questioned for its transparency and responsibility towards
its stakeholders for not revealing the news back in 2015. It seemed that
1
FACEBOOK – CAMBRIDGE ANALYTICA CASE ANALYSIS
Word Count: 1,473 words
, Introduction
Facebook is the biggest social media platform company, which aims to
“connect billions of people around the world” and “bring people closer
together”, according to their website. Facebook operates by collecting and
holding tremendous amounts of its users’ personal information and data,
however recent scandals revealed that millions of user data was breached.
In 2014, Cambridge Analytica has harvested up to 87 million Facebook
user’s personal data for political purposes. Their personal data were used for
psychographic targeting - to generate personality profiles which can be used to
predict and influence their behaviour. In 2015, Facebook found out about their
data breach with Cambridge Analytica, but failed to make any public
statements regarding the incident of how its platform was being used for
political campaigns. The story died, with Facebook still using its data sharing
practices. (Rosenberg, 2018) Three years later, The New York Times and The
Observer published bombshell reports regarding the Facebook and Cambridge
Analytica scandal, finally getting the public’s attention in 2018.
Facebook was questioned for its transparency and responsibility towards
its stakeholders for not revealing the news back in 2015. It seemed that
1
