Zuckerberg to apologize in front of Congress

Mark Zuckerberg will apologize to Congress this week for the data leak that resulted in a political contractor improperly obtaining information on 87 million Facebook users.

In prepared testimony released by the House Energy and Commerce Committee on Monday, the Facebook CEO says that the company did not fully realize its responsibility to users when it comes to privacy or disinformation campaigns on its platform.

{mosads}“We didn’t take a broad enough view of our responsibility, and that was a big mistake,” Zuckerberg plans to say during the Wednesday hearing before the panel. “It was my mistake, and I’m sorry. I started Facebook, I run it, and I’m responsible for what happens here.”

Zuckerberg will also testify in a joint hearing Tuesday before the Senate Commerce and Judiciary committees.

Lawmakers are expected to grill him about Facebook’s response to the Cambridge Analytica scandal. The political consulting group, which worked for President Trump’s 2016 campaign, gained access to tens of millions of Facebook users’ data without their consent.

Zuckerberg will also promise to lawmakers a full audit of Cambridge’s handling of that data. Facebook has said that it received assurances in 2015 that the trove was destroyed, and Cambridge has denied any wrongdoing and said that the information was not used to aid Trump’s campaign.

The Facebook founder will also discuss the changes the company is making to crack down on abuse of user data and to increase transparency about its data practices.

But he’ll also be defending the platform amid mounting questions about its business model, which critics say exploits users’ personal information to generate ad revenue.

“My top priority has always been our social mission of connecting people, building community and bringing the world closer together,” Zuckerberg’s statement reads. “Advertisers and developers will never take priority over that as long as I’m running Facebook.”