Mark Zuckerberg Says Facebook Not Done Enough to Prevent Misuse

Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg apologised to EU lawmakers on Tuesday, saying the company had not done enough to prevent misuse of the social network and that regulation is "important and inevitable". Meeting the leaders of the European Parliament, Zuckerberg stressed the importance of Europeans to Facebook and said he was sorry for not doing enough to prevent abuse of the platform. "We didn't take a broad enough view of our responsibility. That was a mistake and I am sorry for it," Zuckerberg said in his opening remarks.

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In response to questions about whether Facebook ought to be broken up, Zuckerberg said the question was not whether there should be regulation but what kind of regulation there should be. "Some sort of regulation is important and inevitable," he said. He declined to answer when leading lawmakers asked him again as the session concluded whether there was any cross use of data between Facebook and subsidiaries like WhatsApp or on whether he would give an undertaking to let users block targeting adverts. Facebook has been embroiled in a data scandal after it emerged that the personal data of 87 million users were improperly accessed by a political consultancy.

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To recall, A coalition of activists from eight countries, including India and Myanmar, has called on Facebook to put in place a transparent and consistent approach to moderation. In a statement issued on Friday, the coalition demanded civil rights and political bias audits into Facebook's role in abetting human rights abuses, spreading misinformation and manipulation of democratic processes in their respective countries. Besides India and Myanmar, the other countries that the activists represent are Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Vietnam, the Philippines, Syria and Ethiopia. The demands raised by the group bear significance as Facebook has come under fire for its failure to stop the deluge of hate-filled posts against the disenfranchised Rohingya Muslim minority in Myanmar.

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