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The government has sent a show cause notice to Facebook today after the notice to Cambridge Analytica recently. The notice comes even before the deadline for responses given to Cambridge Analytica (March 31), sources close to the development told BusinessLine .
After reports of Facebook breaching data and influencing electoral processes, the government on March 21 had warned the social networking giant saying it can even summon Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Facebook, if found guilty. Later, there have been reports and whistleblowers coming out in public saying Cambridge Analytica, through Facebook has influenced Indian elections and even caste votes were created by them. “The show cause notice to Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook, has gone a few minutes ago and there will be a press notice on this in a while,” a senior government official told BusinessLine .
Sources said Facebook has been asked in the notice, whether the company or its related or downstream agencies utilising its data have previously been engaged by any entities to manipulate the Indian electoral process. “If any such downstream entity misused data from Facebook, what is the protection available to the data subject?,” said one of the queries in the notice.
The government has asked the company to send the responses to the queries by April 7, sources said. The current situation is a very serious for Indian democracy, the source added.
Last week, Minister of Electronics and IT, and Law & Justice, Ravi Shankar Prasad said, “Facebook is welcome to operate in India. I am happy that it has the largest footprint in India with around 20 crore users, but any attempt by Facebook or vendor like Cambridge Analytica to influence elections will not be tolerated.”
He had said the matter has become critical in India too because Facebook and Cambridge Analytica are found to be involved in influencing elections in undesirable manner and the company too admitting the same in Channel 4 News recently.
The government in the notice to Cambridge Analytica had asked whether consent was taken from individuals; who are the entities that engaged the company; how did the firm come to be in possession of such data; how such data was used; and was there any profiling done on the basis of such data?
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