Facebook experiment faces probe
The Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) in the UK is investigating whether Facebook broke data protection laws when it allowed researchers to conduct a psychological experiment on user of the social network, the Financial Times reported.
The data regulator is probing the experiment and plans to query Facebook, the newspaper reported. It was too early to tell what part of the law Facebook may have infringed, the Financial Times quoted an ICO spokesperson as saying.
Facebook's psychological experiment on nearly 700,000 unwitting users in 2012 has caused a social-media furore.
The experiment was to find if Facebook could alter its users' emotional states and spur them to post more positive or negative content.
"It's clear that people were upset by this study and we take responsibility for it," a Facebook spokesman said in an email.
"We want to do better in the future and are improving our process based on this feedback.
"The study was done with approriate protection for people's information and we are happy to answer any question regulators may have."
The ICO monitors has the power to force organisations to change their policies and can levy fines of up to €500,000 (27 million baht).