Brian Acton, the co-founder of WhatsApp, has joined the clamour against Facebook after reports emerged that a British data analytics firm called Cambridge Analytica harvested personal data of Facebook users starting from 2014.
Acton, who quit WhatsApp in late 2017 to start the Signal foundation, joined many others to voice his discontent against Facebook, using the popular hashtag #deletefacebook.
Notably, the popular messaging platform was acquired by Mark Zuckerberg's company for a whopping $19 billion in February 2014. According to The Verge, Acton is currently worth $6.5 billion
In the meantime, as Facebook faces a probe from the Federal Trade Commission in the US as well questions from authorities in UK, its shares fell over 9 percent in the last two days, leading to $50 billion valuation loss, reported The Guardian.
Facebook on Friday, 16 March, had said that it was suspending consulting firm Strategic Communication Laboratories (SCL) and its political data analytics firm Cambridge Analytica after it found they had violated its policies.
The data firm was hired by Donald Trump during the 2016 election campaign. With legal troubles mounting, Donald Trump has hired a former prosecutor who has argued that Trump is the target of an elaborate FBI conspiracy.
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