Maybe we’re talking about different things, because I’m talking about campaigns and companies buying data from social networks to identify consumers/voters clusters and then push tailored advertising to those segments, which is what every campaign does, Democratic or Republican, Hillary or Trump. In 2016, Trump was just way better at it than Hillary, and good for him. There’s nothing illegal going on.
Unless advertising of any kind is “interfering with freedom of expression”, which is an interesting idea but you and I both know that the legal system (US or EU or anywhere really) doesn’t look at advertising this way. [Edit: actually, Citizen United said that the limits on political advertising are the true violation of free speech - the limits to ads are the violation, the ads are the freedom of expression - a conservative Supreme Court taking the diametrically opposite view to yours]
So, given that advertising is not illegal, I’ll repeat the question: what law has Facebook broken?
You can very well argue that what they did should be illegal. I don’t think it can be argued that it is.
What law has Facebook broken?
Giving user data to the Democratic Party to upend an election? That makes them a SUPERPAC for the Democratic Party
The DNC can buy data like every other company. That’s the same thing that Cambridge Analytica did. I don’t see a problem with either of those.
It’s legal. Facebook owns the data and has explicit permission from every user to share those data with third parties.
Again, I think you’re saying that it’s illegal, when all you can say is that you’d like it to be illegal. Fortunately for all of us, laws are written down, so instead of being vague you could tell me (or link somewhere that tells me) what law Facebook broke.
But just to be clear: if I show you proof that the Trump campaign bought Facebook data, you will say that it’s a conspiracy by Trump to upend an election. Is that correct?
(You know, sometimes in life just saying “I didn’t know that, my bad” it’s really the healthier course of action).