Facebook is in middle of big data scandal so why is EC working with it in India?
Facebook has been accused of breaking democracy. It is in the middle of a big data scandal, where the allegations are that it shared data of over 50 million users with a quiz app, the data which ended up in the hands of Cambridge Analytica that reportedly used it to micro-target and influence voters in the US election.
Organisations, people and companies across the world are taking a fresh look at their relationship with Facebook. But apparently in India it is business as usual.
At a time when Facebook stands accused of being a platform that is turning democracy and democratic processes like voting into a farce, the Election Commission of India is going to work with Facebook for elections in Karnataka. We should ask why.
The scandal involving Facebook is in news. All of this is serious, so serious that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has said sorry and has vowed to fix it. It is so serious, this whole fiasco over Facebook using big data for purposes that seem clear breach of privacy, that regulators and lawmakers across the world are looking into it. British lawmakers want Zuckerberg to testify because they believe Facebook might have been used to influence voting in their country.
The US regulators in the US too seek the same and Zuckerberg reportedly has agreed. The FTC, a regulating agency in the US, is official probing if Facebook violated an earlier privacy agreement it signed with government officials.
Then there is the fallout. Mozilla, a browser, just a few days ago pulled out of Facebook ad network because of the privacy issues. There are thousands of people, who have deleted their Facebook accounts or pages, including people like Farhan Akhtar and companies like Tesla. German bank Commerzbank and audio product company Sonos too has pulled off their ads from Facebook. There is hashtag #DeleteFacebook trending.
So, the question, to repeat, needs to be asked, why the Election Commission of India is going ahead with its plans to work with Facebook for an election at a time when Facebook stands accused of being careless about its platform and data that has been used to unethically (and probably illegally) influence voting?
This is not to say that Facebook can’t be a force for good. The die-hard optimists can still believe that Facebook, or for that matter any social media site, could do wonders for democracy. May be Election Commission of India believes it too, even if Facebook itself is no longer sure.
Just a few months ago, the company told the world that it couldn’t guarantee that it was always good for democracies. “I wish I could guarantee that the positives are destined to outweigh the negatives, but I can’t,” Samidh Chakrabarti, a Facebook product manager, wrote on company’s official page.
This means, let’s ask the big question again: Why is the Election Commission of India still going to work with Facebook for arguably one of the most important elections this year?
The standard practice in these cases, in instances when a company or an organisation is in the middle of something as serious as what Facebook has found itself in, is to hit pause. It’s possible that Facebook had no role to play in either the Russian meddling in US elections, or in the Cambridge Analytica scandal, but the right course of action would be to pause all activities until there is a proper investigation and a proper conclusion. This is something agencies and the organisations that take accountability and ethics seriously do.
The Election Commission of India is not just a private entity. Or a small organisation. Any election in India is not some random voting process or a survey. It involves millions and millions of people.
India is the world’s biggest democracy and at a time when the rest of the world is looking at how people have used Facebook data and platform to undermine the democratic processes, Indian regulators cannot be - or rather should not be - seen working with the firm.
In fact, ideally the Election Commission of India should be reviewing how Facebook is used by organisations and people in India for election purposes. We already have the Cambridge Analytica whistleblower Christopher Wylie saying that the data analysis firm is active in Indian elections. That is a serious claim. That is something the Election Commission should be probing and only when it conclusively sees that Facebook is a force for good for democracy it should work with the social media giant.
Chief election commissioner OP Rawat calls the scandal around Facebook an “aberration”.
No sir, definitely not. Mark Zuckerberg doesn’t say sorry for aberrations.