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Cambridge Analytica CEO Alexander Nix is pictured. The company was banned from Facebook on Friday over its handling of user data |
Facebook has suspended Cambridge Analytica, the shadowy firm which worked with the Trump campaign and has been linked to Brexit, claiming it violated its policies by using the information of 270,000 users to inform their tactics.
In 2015, the social network discovered that Cambridge professor Dr. Aleksandr Kogan had given the information to the company after obtaining it legitimately through an app of his own.
The app was called This Is Your Digital Life and was downloaded by Facebook users once they had already logged in.
They willingly submitted their information to This Is Your Digital Life but were unaware what Kogan would do with it next, the site claims.
When Facebook learned that he had shared it with the Cambridge Analytica, they asked both to destroy it.
All assured that they had erased it and they continued using the site.
However several days ago, Facebook claims it received reports that not all of the information was erased.
'We are moving aggressively to determine the accuracy of these claims. If true, this is another unacceptable violation of trust and the commitments they made.
'We are suspending SCL/Cambridge Analytica, Wylie and Kogan from Facebook, pending further information,' Facebook VP and Deputy General Counsel, Paul Grewal, said in a statement.
Cambridge Analytica denies the allegation and insisted on Friday that none of the information it received from Kogan was used in the Trump campaign.
