By Natalia Drozdiak, Valentina Pop and Sam Schechner
BRUSSELS -- Mark Zuckerberg apologized to European Union
lawmakers over the fake-news and privacy scandals engulfing
Facebook Inc., but rebuffed suggestions that the company has
outsize market power and avoided responding to many difficult
questions.
Speaking at a hearing at the European Parliament Tuesday on how
the social network handles Europeans' data, Facebook's CEO echoed
his recent testimony before U.S. Congress on similar issues. "We
didn't take a broad enough view of our responsibility -- that was a
mistake and I'm sorry for it," Mr. Zuckerberg said. "I'm committed
to getting this right."
European lawmakers pressed him on the steps the company has
taken since the revelations that data-analytics firm Cambridge
Analytica improperly obtained the personal information of as many
as 87 million Facebook users. They also questioned Mr. Zuckerberg
over the spread of fake news on the Facebook platform, the
company's market power, and how the social network will comply with
the EU's new privacy law, known as the General Data Protection
Regulation, which enters into force Friday.
Some MEPs fumed that the format of the hearing didn't allow the
CEO to directly respond to all questions posed to him.
As is typical of most European Parliament hearings, Mr.
Zuckerberg grouped his responses after all lawmakers spoke. He
didn't respond to questions over whether the social network would
ever allow users to opt out of targeted advertising, and whether he
thought it was morally correct to collect data on people who don't
use Facebook.
British Conservative MEP Syed Kamall described the process as a
"get out of jail free card" because it gave Mr. Zuckerberg "too
much room to avoid the difficult questions."
Mr. Zuckerberg pledged to follow up on any unanswered questions
in writing over the following days and said the company would soon
send an executive for a more extensive hearing.
European Parliament President Antonio Tajani said the format was
his idea.
Other MEPs were dissatisfied by the substance of Mr.
Zuckerberg's responses. Speaking to reporters after the hearing,
German leftist MEP Gabriele Zimmer called them "very general
answers." Jan Philipp Albrecht, the German MEP from the Green Party
who lead the GDPR negotiations, told reporters: "I am shocked that
Zuckerberg didn't take this seriously at all."
In response to questions about the Cambridge Analytica scandal,
Mr. Zuckerberg said Facebook has more tightly restricted the data
that outside apps can access and has suspended 200 apps it suspects
of having misused user data shared on or through Facebook. He said
the company is reviewing thousands more apps and expects more to be
removed.
He also said Facebook is working to more broadly protect the
integrity of elections, including by encouraging voters to go to
the polls and by working with governments to identify
misinformation threats in real time. The issue is of interest to
MEPs, who face elections next spring.
Mr. Zuckerberg also stressed Facebook's commitment to Europe,
announcing that it would hire an additional 3,000 employees in the
region to reach a total of 10,000 by the end of the year.
Seated around a hoop-shaped table in an intimate wood-paneled
room in the European Parliament, roughly a dozen European lawmakers
individually interrogated the chief executive.
Manfred Weber, the leader of the largest group in the European
Parliament, the European People's Party, said more regulation for
the company was needed and raised the issue of Facebook's market
dominance. "We should discuss breaking up the Facebook monopoly.
Can you convince me not to do so?"
Liberal MEP Guy Verhofstadt also dug into the question of the
company's market power, stressing that self-regulation wouldn't be
enough to control the company. "We have a big problem here," he
said, asking Mr. Zuckerberg to decide whether he wants to be
remembered "in fact as a genius who created a digital monster that
is destroying our democracies and our societies."
In response, Mr. Zuckerberg said the company "exists in a very
competitive space, where people use a lot of different tools for
communication" adding that advertisers have "a lot of choice" in
terms of where they choose to advertise.
The hearing comes amid greater scrutiny of tech giants by
authorities and regulators around the world, who are increasingly
looking to Europe for direction on how to rein in the Silicon
Valley firms over their privacy policies, market power, tax
payments and other issues.
The GDPR, the EU's new privacy law, is one such piece of
legislation. Mr. Zuckerberg said the company would be compliant
with the new rules by Friday, adding that a large portion of
European users already reviewed and consented to the new privacy
policies designed to meet the demands of the new law.
Brussels is the first stop for Mr. Zuckerberg as he seeks to
calm tensions with European officials. On Wednesday, Mr. Zuckerberg
will travel to Paris, where he will attend a government-organized
lunch with executives from Uber Technologies Inc., Microsoft Corp.
and other firms about using technology to promote the common good,
and Thursday he will speak at a tech conference.
In Paris, Mr. Zuckerberg will have a private meeting with French
President Emmanuel Macron. "No subject will be avoided," an
official at the French presidential palace said of the meeting with
Mr. Zuckerberg. "The president is very direct."
EU and European national regulators for years have been among
the most active world-wide in trying to bridle Facebook. A working
group of several EU data-protection watchdogs brought sanctions
against the company for prior changes to its privacy policies,
though some of those decisions were thrown out in court. Some EU
regulators are also investigating the company's use of data about
users of chat app WhatsApp, which it bought in 2014 for $22
billion.
Persuading Mr. Zuckerberg to speak was a victory for the
751-member parliament, which is the EU's most democratic
institution but wields little power. Facebook has so far spurned a
similar invitation from the U.K. parliament. Mr. Zuckerberg had
initially agreed to answer questions in a closed-door meeting. That
sparked outrage from many EU politicians and commentators,
prompting the parliament to negotiate an agreement to webcast the
event.
--Deepa Seetharaman in San Francisco contributed to this
article.
Write to Natalia Drozdiak at natalia.drozdiak@wsj.com, Valentina
Pop at valentina.pop@wsj.com and Sam Schechner at
sam.schechner@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
May 22, 2018 16:56 ET (20:56 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2018 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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