*LONDON: Facebook will be fined £500,000 in the U.K. after the country’sprivacy watchdog said its data sharing scandal broke the law.*
The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) is hitting the social networkwith the maximum possible fine it can impose, for two breaches of theU.K.’s Data Protection Act.
Facebook failed to safeguard people’s information, the ICO said and was nottransparent about the way in which user data was harvested by others.
“Trust and confidence in the integrity of our democratic processes riskbeing disrupted because the average voter has little idea of what is goingon behind the scenes,” Information Commissioner Elizabeth Denham said in astatement on Wednesday.
Denham added: “New technologies that use data analytics to micro-targetpeople give campaign groups the ability to connect with individual voters.But this cannot be at the expense of transparency, fairness and compliancewith the law.”
She said that fines and prosecutions “punish the bad actors” but that hertrue aim was to “effect change and restore trust and confidence in ourdemocratic system.”
The ICO said it will send out warning letters and audit notices to 11political parties and will seek a criminal prosecution for SCL, the parentcompany of the now-defunct controversial political data analytics firmCambridge Analytica.
The fine on Facebook was unveiled as part of the ICO’s report investigatingwhether personal data had been misused by political campaigns during the2016 referendum on the U.K.’s membership of the European Union.
“As we have said before, we should have done more to investigate claimsabout Cambridge Analytica and take action in 2015,” Erin Egan, chiefprivacy officer at Facebook, said in an emailed statement.
“We have been working closely with the ICO in their investigation ofCambridge Analytica, just as we have with authorities in the US and othercountries. We’re reviewing the report and will respond to the ICO soon.”