Under fire for the worst privacy debacle in his company鈥檚 history, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg batted away often-aggressive questioning from lawmakers who accused him of failing to protect the personal information of millions of Americans from Russians intent on upsetting the U.S. election.
During some five hours of Senate questioning Tuesday, Zuckerberg apologized several times for Facebook failures, disclosed that his company was 鈥渨orking with鈥� special counsel Robert Mueller in the federal probe of Russian election interference and said it was working hard to change its own operations after the harvesting of users鈥� private data by a data-mining company affiliated with Donald Trump鈥檚 campaign.
Seemingly unimpressed, Republican Sen. John Thune of South Dakota said Zuckerberg鈥檚 company had a 14-year history of apologizing for 鈥渋ll-advised decisions鈥� related to user privacy. 鈥淗ow is today鈥檚 apology different?鈥� Thune asked.
鈥淲e have made a lot of mistakes in running the company,鈥� Zuckerberg conceded, and Facebook must work harder at ensuring the tools it creates are used in 鈥済ood and healthy鈥� ways.
The controversy has brought a flood of bad publicity and sent the company鈥檚 stock value plunging, but Zuckerberg seemed to achieve a measure of success in countering that: Facebook shares surged 4.5 per cent for the day, the biggest gain in two years.
In all, he skated largely unharmed through his first day of congressional testimony. He鈥檒l face House questioners Wednesday.
The 33-year-old founder of the world鈥檚 best-known social media giant appeared in a suit and tie, a departure from the T-shirt he鈥檚 famous for wearing in public as well as in private. Even so, his youth cast a sharp contrast with his often-elderly, grey-haired Senate inquisitors. And the enormous complexity of the social network he created at times defeated the attempts of legislators to hammer him on Facebook鈥檚 specific failures and how to fix them.
The stakes are high for both Zuckerberg and his company. Facebook has been reeling from its worst-ever privacy failure following revelations last month that the political data-mining firm Cambridge Analytica, which was affiliated with Trump鈥檚 2016 campaign, improperly scooped up data on some 87 million users. Zuckerberg has been on an apology tour for most of the past two weeks, culminating in his congressional appearance Tuesday.
Although shaky at times, Zuckerberg seemed to gain confidence as the day progressed. An iconic figure as a billionaire entrepreneur who changed the way people around the world relate to each other, he made a point of repeatedly referring back to the Harvard dorm room where he said Facebook was brought to life.
At times, he showed plenty of steel. After aggressive questioning about Facebook鈥檚 alleged political bias from Sen. Ted Cruz, for instance, Zuckerberg was asked if he was ready to take a break.
No need. 鈥淭hat was pretty good,鈥� he said of the exchange with Cruz.
For the most part, his careful but generally straightforward answers, steeped in the sometimes arcane details of Facebook鈥檚 underlying functions, often deflected aggressive questioning. When the going got tough, Zuckerberg was able to fall back on: 鈥淥ur team should follow up with you on that, Senator.鈥�
As a result, he found it relatively easy to return to familiar talking points: Facebook made mistakes, he and his executives are very sorry, and they鈥檙e working very hard to correct the problems and safeguard the users鈥� data.
As for the federal Russia probe that has occupied much of Washington鈥檚 attention for months, he said he had not been interviewed by special counsel Mueller鈥檚 team, but 鈥淚 know we鈥檙e working with them.鈥� He offered no details, citing a concern about confidentiality rules of the investigation.
Earlier this year Mueller charged 13 Russian individuals and three Russian companies in a plot to interfere in the 2016 presidential election through a social media propaganda effort that included online ad purchases using U.S. aliases and politicking on U.S. soil. A number of the Russian ads were on Facebook.
Much of the effort was aimed at denigrating Democrat Hillary Clinton and thereby helping Republican Trump, or simply encouraging divisiveness and undercutting faith in the U.S. system.
Zuckerberg said Facebook had been led to believe Cambridge Analytica had deleted the user data it had harvested and that had been 鈥渃learly a mistake.鈥� He said Facebook had considered the data collection 鈥渁 closed case鈥� and had not alerted the Federal Trade Commission. He assured senators the company would handle the situation differently today.
Separately, the company began alerting some of its users that their data was gathered by Cambridge Analytica. A notification that appeared on Facebook for some users Tuesday told them that 鈥渙ne of your friends鈥� used Facebook to log into a now-banned personality quiz app called 鈥淭his Is Your Digital Life.鈥� The notice says the app misused the information, including public profiles, page likes, birthdays and current cities, by sharing it with Cambridge Analytica.
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In the hearings, Zuckerberg is trying to both restore public trust in his company and stave off federal regulations that some lawmakers have floated.
Democrat Bill Nelson of Florida said he believes Zuckerberg was taking the congressional hearings seriously 鈥渂ecause he knows there is going to be a hard look at regulation.鈥�
Republicans have yet to get behind any legislation, but that could change.
Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., asked Zuckerberg if he would be willing to work with lawmakers to examine what 鈥渞egulations you think are necessary in your industry.鈥�
Absolutely, Zuckerberg responded, saying later in an exchange with Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, that 鈥淚鈥檓 not the type of person who thinks that all regulation is bad.鈥�
Ahead of the hearing, John Cornyn of Texas, the No. 2 Republican in the Senate, said, 鈥淭his is a serious matter, and I think people expect us to take action.鈥�
At the hearing, Zuckerberg said: 鈥淲e didn鈥檛 take a broad enough view of our responsibility, and that was a big mistake. It was my mistake, and I鈥檓 sorry. I started Facebook, I run it, and I鈥檓 responsible for what happens here.鈥�
He outlined steps the company has taken to restrict outsiders鈥� access to people鈥檚 personal information. He also said the company is investigating every app that had access to a large amount of information before the company moved to prevent such access in 2014 鈥� actions that came too late in the Cambridge Analytica case.
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Associated Press writers Richard Lardner and Lisa Mascaro contributed to this report. Ortutay and Hamilton reported from New York.
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Mary Clare Jalonick, Barbara Ortutay And David Hamilton, The Associated Press
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