Zuckerberg says sorry to Europe

@ 2018/05/25
But some European politicians want a break up of Facebook

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg has apologised to EU lawmakers for the company's role in the Cambridge Analytica scandal and for allowing fake news to swamp the site.

Zuckerberg apologised to MEPs for Facebook's tools being used "for harm" but it does not see that he earned many friends doing so.

Damian Collins, chair of the UK Parliament's Digital Culture Media and Sport Committee later said the session at the European Parliament had been a "missed opportunity" and that the questioning format allowed Zuckerberg to cherry-pick his responses and not respond to each point.

Still, Zuckerberg got a much rougher ride than he did from the US politicians in April. This was mostly because MEPs involved in the questioning had not received cheques from Facebook as campaign donations and so did not owe Zuckerberg anything.

While the US politicians took turns to cross-examine the Facebook chief in a series of back-and-forth exchanges, the leaders of the European Parliament's various political groups each asked several questions apiece.

Zuckerberg spent 22 minutes going through the huge number of questions put to him during the session and was able to pick and choose the ones he wanted to answer.

Several of the politicians expressed frustration at this and one accused Zuckerberg of having "asked for this format for a reason".

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