Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg testifies for 10 hours before Congress, apologizing for data breaches and promising reforms while avoiding real accountability for platform’s role in election manipulation
Christopher Wylie reveals Cambridge Analytica harvested 87 million Facebook profiles without consent for political manipulation, triggering global privacy crisis
Facebook suspends Cambridge Analytica and parent company SCL from its platform following explosive revelations by whistleblower Christopher Wylie about systematic data harvesting affecting 87 million users. The suspension comes only after The Guardian and New York Times publish comprehensive exposés …
Facebook embeds staff directly in Trump campaign headquarters in San Antonio, working side-by-side with campaign staff including Cambridge Analytica to optimize Facebook advertising for voter targeting and suppression. The unprecedented corporate-political coordination provides Trump’s …
Cambridge Analytica utilizes 87 million harvested Facebook profiles to conduct targeted psychological manipulation for Donald Trump’s presidential campaign. The operation represents systematic electoral interference using illegally obtained personal data to influence American voters through …
The Guardian’s Harry Davies published the first exposé revealing Cambridge Analytica’s use of harvested Facebook data for US Senator Ted Cruz’s presidential campaign without user consent. Millions of Americans’ personal information were collected and weaponized for political …
Strategic Communication Laboratories (SCL) Group enters into contract with Aleksandr Kogan’s Global Science Research to acquire Facebook user data for Cambridge Analytica’s political targeting operations. This partnership transforms Kogan’s academic research into a commercial data …
University of Cambridge researcher Aleksandr Kogan develops the “thisisyourdigitallife” personality quiz app through his company Global Science Research, designed to exploit Facebook’s API permissions to harvest user data. The app is marketed as a psychological research tool …
Cambridge University researcher Aleksandr Kogan developed a personality-quiz app that collected data via Facebook’s API and shared it with Cambridge Analytica. Regulators later documented deceptive practices; Facebook estimated up to ~87 million users were affected.