During the 2016 presidential race, Cambridge Analytica, a consulting firm, used data from up to eighty-seven million Facebook profiles to target voters on behalf of Donald Trump. An academic researcher had access to the data as part of a standard research arrangement, but then sold it, in defiance of Facebook’s rules. The breach caused a systemic shock: what had seemed like an innocuous research project allowed a firm to weaponize personal information for use in a propaganda campaign.
Silicon Valley’s Stonewalling
