Skip to main content

The context you need, when you need it

When news breaks, you need to understand what actually matters — and what to do about it. At Vox, our mission to help you make sense of the world has never been more vital. But we can’t do it on our own.

We rely on readers like you to fund our journalism. Will you support our work and become a Vox Member today?

Join now

The Facebook-Cambridge Analytica apology tour continues, with full-page ads in major newspapers

“I promise to do better for you,” CEO Mark Zuckerberg says in the ads.

On Wednesday night, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg ended days of silence on the social networking giant’s latest controversy: Revelations that a political data firm called Cambridge Analytica absconded with the data of 50 million unsuspecting Facebook users, which Facebook knew about but kept secret.

Zuckerberg gave apologetic interviews that night to CNN, Wired and the New York Times — as well as Recode’s Kara Swisher and Kurt Wagner, to whom he said he’d be “open” to testifying in front of Congress. Which is fortuitous, because Congress is very open to that idea, too.

Today, the apology tour extended into print media: Facebook purchased full-page ads in several newspapers with apology letters attributed to Zuckerberg. The papers reached include the NYT, the Washington Post and the Observer, a British newspaper published by the Guardian that Facebook allegedly threatened with a lawsuit when its reporters were about to publish a story about Cambridge Analytica.

In the full-page ads, the company reiterates its messages of “we should have done more then” and “we’ll do better,” specifically pledging to “tell everyone affected” if and when it finds more examples of apps connected to its platform that made off with non-consenting users’ data.

The full text of the ad is below. For more, check out the latest episode of Too Embarrassed to Ask, in which Swisher and Wagner talk with Lauren Goode about what and why Facebook has been saying what it is.


We have a responsibility to protect your information. If we can’t, we don’t deserve it.

You may have heard about a quiz app built by a university researcher that leaked Facebook data of millions of people in 2014. This was a breach of trust, and I’m sorry we didn’t do more at the time. We’re now taking steps to make sure this doesn’t happen again.

We’ve already stopped apps like this from getting so much information. Now we’re limiting the data apps get when you sign in using Facebook.

We’re also investigating every single app that had access to large amounts of data before we fixed this. We expect there are others. And when we find them, we will ban them and tell everyone affected.

Finally, we’ll remind you which apps you’ve given access to your information — so you can shut off the ones you don’t want anymore.

Thank you for believing in this community. I promise to do better for you.

Mark Zuckerberg

This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

More in Technology

Technology
The case for AI realismThe case for AI realism
Technology

AI isn’t going to be the end of the world — no matter what this documentary sometimes argues.

By Shayna Korol
Politics
OpenAI’s oddly socialist, wildly hypocritical new economic agendaOpenAI’s oddly socialist, wildly hypocritical new economic agenda
Politics

The AI company released a set of highly progressive policy ideas. There’s just one small problem.

By Eric Levitz
Future Perfect
Human bodies aren’t ready to travel to Mars. Space medicine can help.Human bodies aren’t ready to travel to Mars. Space medicine can help.
Future Perfect

Protecting astronauts in space — and maybe even Mars — will help transform health on Earth.

By Shayna Korol
Podcasts
The importance of space toilets, explainedThe importance of space toilets, explained
Podcast
Podcasts

Houston, we have a plumbing problem.

By Peter Balonon-Rosen and Sean Rameswaram
Technology
What happened when they installed ChatGPT on a nuclear supercomputerWhat happened when they installed ChatGPT on a nuclear supercomputer
Technology

How they’re using AI at the lab that created the atom bomb.

By Joshua Keating
Future Perfect
Humanity’s return to the moon is a deeply religious missionHumanity’s return to the moon is a deeply religious mission
Future Perfect

Space barons like Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk don’t seem religious. But their quest to colonize outer space is.

By Sigal Samuel