Still reeling from its Cambridge Analytica scandal, where millions of users' personal data had been gathered without consent for political campaign purposes, Facebook's co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced a new vision for the social networking platform focused on user privacy last March, which focuses on several key points like encryption and safety for its users.
However, due to a new bilateral data access treaty called the CLOUD (Clarifying Lawful Overseas Use of Data) Act, which was just recently signed between the US and the UK, Facebook is now being pressured to provide backdoors into its Facebook Messenger, Instagram, and WhatsApp services to allow law enforcement access to user messages. This policy allows government agencies to monitor suspected criminals even when they "go dark," where activities are moved from unencrypted public channels to encrypted platforms, at the expense of user privacy and security.
In an open letter drafted by several public officials from the US, the UK, and Australia, the move was made to allow law enforcement to track illegal activity, such as child abuse and terrorism, happening through Facebook's messaging services as a means of ensuring public safety. An excerpt from the letter is shown below:
"We must find a way to balance the need to secure data with public safety and the need for law enforcement to access the information they need to safeguard the public, investigate crimes, and prevent future criminal activity."
With plans to integrate all three messaging services, Facebook has taken more steps to protect its users' privacy and data by using end-to-end encryption, which allows only the sender and receiver to decrypt the content of messages. To install a backdoor in their systems would not only compromise user privacy but can also pose an intentional vulnerability and security risk to user data, which can then be exploited for dubious means. In a recent statement from one of its spokespersons, Facebook reiterated its stance on opposing the creation of backdoors in its services. The company insists that people have the right to have their private conversations remain private on their platform, and that government attempts to build backdoors would undermine that privacy and security.
As to the alleged criminal activities happening on the social media platform, the statement also goes over Facebook's efforts to combat these without breaching user privacy. Along with consulting experts in child safety, government, and technology, Facebook is building new tools and dedicating new teams to keep its users safe.
How Facebook is going to deal with the CLOUD Act and government pressure, especially as the company is trying to repair its tarnished reputation in the face of several data privacy scandals, will be decided in the coming months. With 60% of Americans not trusting Facebook at all, according to a poll by the Wall Street Journal, giving in to the demands could be the final nail in the coffin for the social media platform.
As to how both big tech and government can find a compromise between user privacy and public safety, only time can tell.
