[ By Bobby Anthony ]Brazil's Ministry of Justice and Public Security has imposed a fine of USD 1.6 million on Facebook for sharing of data belonging to 4,43,000 Brazilian users in relation to the Cambridge Analytica case.According to the Brazilian government, there was evidence of an “abusive” practice when it came to data of these users by Facebook Inc and Facebook Serviços Online do...
Brazil's Ministry of Justice and Public Security has imposed a fine of USD 1.6 million on Facebook for sharing of data belonging to 4,43,000 Brazilian users in relation to the Cambridge Analytica case.
According to the Brazilian government, there was evidence of an “abusive” practice when it came to data of these users by Facebook Inc and Facebook Serviços Online do Brasil Ltda.
“It is clear that data from approximately 4,43,000 users of the platform were misused by developers of thisisyourdigitallife application for at least questionable purposes,” concluded the Department of Consumer Protection (DPDC), which works under the Ministry, as cited in a recent statement.
The case was investigated after the media reported in April 2018 that Brazilian Facebook users may have fallen victim to misuse of their data by the political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica.
Earlier, Cambridge Analytica, which collaborated with the team of US President Donald Trump during his 2016 election campaign, had stated that it used data provided by Facebook to develop a computer program designed to predict decisions of voters and exert influence.
At that time, the DPDC was attentive to the testimony which Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg gave before the US Congress, which justified the opening of a process against the company as well as an investigation into the alleged leak which affected Brazilian users.
According to Facebook, out of the nearly 87 million people whose data was exposed, some 4,43,000 are users from Brazil who were notified about what had happened.