META Meta Platforms Inc

By Natalia Drozdiak in Brussels and Sam Schechner in Paris 

European Union officials said they would probe Facebook Inc.'s handling of user data on Monday, after the social network said it is investigating whether a firm linked to the 2016 Trump campaign improperly kept user's personal data for years despite saying it had destroyed those records.

"Allegations of misuse of Facebook user data is an unacceptable violation of our citizens' privacy rights. The European Parliament will investigate fully, calling digital platforms to account," the parliament's president, Antonio Tajani, said on his official Twitter account.

Facebook shares dropped more than 5% in early trading.

The EU's justice chief, V ra Jourová, described the news that data was misused for political purpose as "horrifying, if confirmed," adding that she expected "companies to take more responsibility when handling our personal data."

Ms. Jourová said she would seek further clarifications from Facebook and would discuss the matter with U.S. government officials on her scheduled trip to the U.S. this week. Ms. Jourová is set to meet with Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross.

A spokesman for Facebook Monday referred to the company's comments over the weekend that the firm is "moving aggressively to determine the accuracy of these claims."

Sparks are flying because the revelation links two of the biggest and most politically sensitive complaints about Facebook. Privacy activists have long accused Facebook of taking too much information about users, leading to investigations in several parts of Europe. More recently, evidence has emerged--and the company has acknowledged--that politicians and Russian hackers attempted to manipulate the social network in an effort to influence elections in the U.S., U.K. and elsewhere.

Now the two threads are joined, with the granularity of Facebook's user data allegedly being illicitly repurposed by political operatives.

The EU officials' comments come after U.S. and British lawmakers slammed Facebook over the weekend for not providing more information about how data firm Cambridge Analytica came to access information about potentially tens of millions of users without their explicit permission.

A spokesperson for Cambridge Analytica didn't immediately respond to a request for comment on Monday.

Cambridge Analytica was a top vendor to Mr. Trump's 2016 campaign and has come under scrutiny in special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into whether Trump associates colluded with Russia's efforts to interfere in the U.S. election. Mr. Trump has denied any collusion by his campaign with the Russians, and Moscow has denied meddling in the election.

Cambridge Analytica, which is an affiliate of British firm SCL Group Ltd., is also under scrutiny for whether it played a role in the U.K.'s 2016 Brexit referendum, something the company has denied.

Late Friday, Facebook said it suspended Cambridge and two individuals-- Aleksandr Kogan, a psychology professor from the University of Cambridge, and Christopher Wylie, who helped found Cambridge. Facebook said it learned in 2015 that Mr. Kogan broke Facebook policy and shared the user data with third parties. The company said it demanded he and third parties with access to the data delete those records but learned this month the data hadn't been destroyed. Facebook has argued the matter didn't constitute a data breach.

Mr. Wylie revealed to the New York Times and U.K. newspaper The Observer how Cambridge used personal data without authorization to build a system to target individual U.S. voters with political advertisements.

Ms. Jourova said she welcomed an investigation by the U.K. Information Commissioner's Office, an independent body tasked with protection of personal data, and was "ready to help."

Elizabeth Denham, Information Commissioner, Monday said her office was pursuing a number of lines of inquiry and that "any criminal or civil enforcement actions arising from it will be pursued vigorously."

Data privacy is a sensitive issue in Europe due to its history of communist and Nazi governments spying on their citizens. European privacy rules generally stricter than in the U.S. and set to become even more so when new regulations enter into force in May. Under the so-called general data protection regulation, national privacy authorities will gain more powers and can hit companies with fines as high as 4% of global revenue if they breach the rules.

While the European Parliament doesn't have the power to issue fines, it could organize hearings that would require executives to provide detailed clarifications and defend themselves in public. In the U.K., Damian Collins, the British lawmaker who chairs a parliamentary committee on media and culture, said he intended to ask Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg to testify, or send a senior executive to do so, as part of an inquiry into how social-media manipulation affected the outcome of Britain's referendum on exiting the European Union.

James Slack, a spokesman for U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May, said the allegations against Cambridge Analytica were concerning. "It is essential that people can have confidence that their personal data will be protected and used in an appropriate way," he said Monday, adding that it's right Britain's information commissioner is investigating the matter. "We expect Facebook, Cambridge Analytica and all the organizations involved to cooperate fully."

Jenny Gross in London contributed to this article.

Write to Natalia Drozdiak at natalia.drozdiak@wsj.com and Sam Schechner at sam.schechner@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

March 19, 2018 10:34 ET (14:34 GMT)

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