Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg will accept responsibility for the social network's failure to protect private data and prevent manipulation of the platform, according to testimony released on the eve of his first Congressional appearance.
"We didn't take a broad enough view of our responsibility, and that was a big mistake. It was my mistake, and I'm sorry," Mr Zuckerberg said in his written testimony released by a House of Representatives panel.
"I started Facebook, I run it, and I'm responsible for what happens here."
Mr Zuckerberg is to testify before senators tomorrow, and a House panel on Wednesday.
Separately, Facebook account holders whose information was improperly shared with UK political consultancy firm Cambridge Analytica will hear today how their accounts were affected.
Up to 87 million users around the world, including up to 45,000 in Ireland, had their personal information gathered by a third party app in 2013 and passed to Cambridge Analytica.
Facebook telling users if their data was shared with Cambridge Analytica - reports @willgoodbody pic.twitter.com/hxAxCflP9P
— RTÉ News (@rtenews) April 9, 2018
An app that was created in 2013, called This Is Your Digital Life, was placed on to the Facebook platform.
It purported to be a personality test but it was actually gathering data about Facebook users in the background. That data was then passed on to the UK political consultancy firm.
It is alleged that Cambridge Analytica then used that data to try to manipulate the US presidential election of 2016.
Last week, Facebook said up to 87 million users on its platform could have been affected.
From 5pm today, it started telling people whether they are among that group, or not.
They will communicate this by placing a message at the top of people's news feeds if they have been affected, giving them access to privacy controls to stop other third party app developers from gathering their data.
Those in Ireland who were not affected will also get a message, giving them an option to shut off the link to third party app developers.
However, people who were affected but are no longer on Facebook will not find out about this.
Meanwhile, Facebook has suspended another data analytics firm from its platform as it investigates whether it improperly harvested and shared user data.
The company, Cubeyou, operated a number of personality quizz apps including 'You Are What You Like' and 'Apply Magic Sauce', developed in partnership with Cambridge University's Psychometric Centre for non-profit academic research.
However, an investigation by CNBC claims that the information was shared with marketers, in a manner similar to Cambridge Analytica.
"These are serious claims and we have suspended CubeYou from Facebook while we investigate them," Facebook said.
"If they refuse or fail our audit, their apps will be banned from Facebook.
"In addition, we will work with the UK ICO to ask the University of Cambridge about the development of apps in general by its Psychometrics Centre given this case and the misuse by [Aleksandr] Kogan.
"We want to thank CNBC for bringing this case to our attention."
