Data privacy rights stronger after Cambridge Analytica scandal

Kaiser, a former Cambridge Analytica staffer-turned-whistleblower, who testified in a 2018 British parliamentary inquiry into fake news and misinformation, said digital literacy has improved since the scandal broke. — Photo by Towfiqu barbhuiya on Unsplash

LONDON: Five years after the Cambridge Analytica scandal involving Facebook, digital rights activists David Carroll and Brittany Kaiser said major steps have been taken towards consumers securing the right to own their data.

The consulting firm Cambridge Analytica illegally used private data, harvested from 87 million Facebook users, to persuade undecided U.S. voters in 2016 to back Donald Trump in the presidential election, and to sway British voters to leave the European Union.