Disclosure Protections May Not Apply to Some Facebook App Records in Healey Probe

Facebook Inc. could be required to disclose some of its records identifying apps that allegedly misused customer data in a privacy investigation brought on by state Attorney General Maura Healey.The Massachusetts Supreme Court found that some of Facebook’s app records could be turned over to Healey as she has demonstrated substantial need for them, while others may be protected from disclosure. Facebook is a social networking company that operates through its website and mobile app. It has more than one billion daily users and more than two billion active accounts. Data Misuse Sparks Wave of Litigation Healey’s investigation comes on the back of the Cambridge Analytica incident initially reported in March 2018. The incident involved an early version of Facebook Platform, a service that connects Facebook users with third-party app developers and enables users to share Facebook data with the apps and developers. A man named Aleksandr Kogan used an early version of the Platform to access and collect data from as many as 87 million Facebook users worldwide, roughly 70 million in the U.S. He then sold the data to Cambridge Analytica, a political data analytics and advertising firm, which used it to create psychographic profiles on the Facebook…
Read More