Nature of the Crisis and Stakeholders

Internet bought the new way of communication which is known as Social Media. Social Media provides a platform to the users to interact, publish and promote their ideas. Social media came with the opportunities and threat; it provides a new tool to communicate fast with each other (Dempsey & Ho, 2010). It is helpful for every individual or organisation until it is not used in wrong way. It can damage the reputation of the organisation especially when social media is used in a wrong way like Facebook leaked the personal data of users to Cambridge Analytica. In this report, a case of organisation is analysed which reflect the negative online communication and the title of the case is “Facebook – Cambridge Analytica”.  

In the case of Facebook- Cambridge Analytica the controversy is that Facebook leaked the personal data of public to Cambridge Analytica. Cambridge is a consultancy firm for political parties and after the investigation of scandal; it was found that it does not work in a legal way because it used personal data of individuals without their consent. It helped the political campaigns to reach the voters through social media. It gathered the data which was collected from the personal data of public including online information to build profiles of voters. Then the company used the computer programs to analysed the factors and predict the voter’s behaviour. The firm collected the personal data from Facebook to affect the elections. Thus, it can be said that Facebook management was also a partner in this case. In this case, top management of Facebook; researcher ‘Kogan’ who works for Cambridge Analytica; professor ‘Aleksandr Kosinski’ and the top management of Cambridge Analytica was involved in collecting and analysing the personal data of public (Boulianne, 2015).

Before 2016, Cambridge Analytica was a political consultancy firm and at the time of the election, Cambridge Analytica played a key role in the Donald Trump’s victory. Researchers of the Cambridge played an important role for the firms. Facebook allowed Michal Kosinski to collect the personal data from online applications. The researcher Michal Kosinski; investigated personal profiles by a single like on Facebook. Kosinski created an online personality quiz in which the users were required to login using their Facebook account. With this Konsinski collected huge amount of personal data from each user’s profile. It was founded that the Facebook was a good source of prediction for the campaign. Cambridge’s psychology professor Aleksandr Kogan tried to buy the data from Konsinski but he declined; after this Cambridge paid 1 million to Kogan to create the firms personality application to collect the personal data. With the help of each other, Kosinski and Cambridge attracted around 2,70,000 users to take the participation in personality quiz data. Facebook also allowed Kogan to collect the huge amount of information of friends of the users. Kogan collected the data of 50 million people from 2,70,000 Facebook users (Cohen, 2016). 

Social, Economic and Historic Context

With the help of this data, the Kogan group analysed the voter’s religion, education level and other factors from which they can predict the voter’s personality and their voting preferences. This prediction was the part of the victory of Donald Trump in the election of President of America. With the help of the data; Kogan advertised the factors from which political parties were affected as well as Public. From the advertisement, the public was more affected because indirectly their demand and needs are raised in front of the government however their personal data was used (Ward, 2018). It can be said that the way research was conducted, was an unethical way of doing it.

When the news about such a scam came into the public, there was a huge disappointment observed among the users of Facebook. A lot of negative communication started about Facebook and Cambridge Analytica. After this much negativity it became necessary for Facebook to control this negative communication. The CEO of Facebook broke his silence on the Cambridge Analytica when the top authorities started investigating the scandal. At this tipping point, Facebook apologised and said: “we have a responsibility to protect your data, and if we can’t then we don’t deserve to serve you” (Business Insider, 2018).

In order to handle the negative communication, Facebook followed a six step process. The company reviewed all the applications which were being used and it changed the log in data from which only users can see their profiles. The company organised the programs to provide the rewards to the users to find the developers those who misused the data. It closed the accounts of those people who did not use their account since 3 months (Vox, 2018).

It can be said that the company handled this situation very efficiently. But there are other many ways through which company could have handled the negative communication. Facebook can give the unlimited opportunities to engage with brands which help the company to build the trust again (Davis, Piven, & Breazeale, 2014). They can offer more benefits from which the users get attracted towards its services. The company has to advertise its services at the time of installation of the new application; this advertisement can help the company to promote the services as well as increasing the number of users (CNBC, 2018). Agreeing the mistake in front of Facebook users and promise to make the things better in Future is also a way to boost the trust. These are the other ways through which Facebook could have handled the negative communication more efficiently.

Handling situation

The company got success in handling this issue. Facebook users got affected but not much because there are many benefit that Facebook provided to its users to handle the scandal. Facebook took steps towards the scandal and prevented the reputation of it (BGR, 2018). Facebook still has millions of users; the rate of users is not affected too much. Thus, it can be said that Facebook handled this scandal very efficiently.

It can be said that the waiting make things worse; Facebook knew in 2015 that Cambridge Analytica uses the users’ data without authorization but it did not respond. After a year, the story broke and stock prices plummeted. Facebook was required to control the case at the initial stage but it did not respond. It is necessary to stop the crises at the initial stage by responding on it (Kezer, Sevi, Cemalcilar, and Baruh, 2016).

In the Facebook Cambridge Analytica case, Facebook learned that it has to give more attention to the data security. It is a lesson for the other online companies to take more attention to data security.

The third thing that the Facebook learnt from this scandal that the top management of the Facebook has to audit the operations on regular basis. Not only for Facebook; but it is a lesson for the other companies too, to audit the work on the regular basis (Lee, 2018).

Conclusion:

From the above analysis, it has been concluded that social media has a positive impact on the organisation until it is not used in a wrong manner or with the wrong intention. In the case of Facebook- Cambridge Analytica, Facebook leaked the personal data to Cambridge Analytica and the firm used this data to predict the voting preferences of voters. Facebook handled this scandal very efficiently by using the six step model. Quick response and understanding the complaints of the users helped to control the negative communication online. The case study leaves a lesson for all the online organisations. The companies have to be aware about the misuse of data by auditing the work of the employees on a regular basis. This case concluded that the online communication is a good source to exchange the ideas with the millions of people but the negative use of online communication harms the organisation as well as the users. Hence, it becomes essential for the organizations to audit and control the data theft.

References:

BGR. (2018). Facebook-Cambridge Analytica data scandal: How to stop those creepy targeted ads. Retrieved from: https://www.bgr.in/how-to/how-to-turn-off-targeted-ads-on-facebook/

Boulianne, S. (2015). Social media use and participation: A meta-analysis of current research. Information, Communication & Society, 18(5), 524-538.

Business Insider. (2018). The 3 steps Mark Zuckerberg says Facebook will take to avoid a repeat of the Cambridge Analytica scandal. Retrieved from: https://www.businessinsider.in/The-3-steps-Mark-Zuckerberg-says-Facebook-will-take-to-avoid-a-repeat-of-the-Cambridge-Analytica-scandal/articleshow/63405562.cms

CNBC. (2018). Facebook-Cambridge Analytica: A timeline of the data hijacking scandal. Retrieved from: https://www.cnbc.com/2018/04/10/facebook-cambridge-analytica-a-timeline-of-the-data-hijacking-scandal.html

Cohen, B. B. (2016). The Utility of Scandal: Examples across Disciplines from Europe and India. History Compass, 14(7), 304-313.

Davis, R., Piven, I., & Breazeale, M. (2014). Conceptualizing the brand in social media community: The ?ve sources mode. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 21, 468-481.

Dempsey, M. & Ho, J. (2010). Viral marketing: Motivations to forward online content. Journal of business research, 63, 1000-1006.

Kezer, M., Sevi, B., Cemalcilar, Z. and Baruh, L. (2016). Age differences in privacy attitudes, literacy and privacy management on Facebook. Cyberpsychology: Journal of Psychosocial Re5search on Cyberspace, 10(1).

Lee, T. B. (2018). Facebook’s Cambridge Analytica scandal, explained [Updated]. Retrieved from: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2018/03/facebooks-cambridge-analytica-scandal-explained/

Vox. (2018). The Facebook and Cambridge Analytica scandal, explained with a simple diagram. Retrieved from: https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/3/23/17151916/facebook-cambridge-analytica-trump-diagram

Ward, K. (2018). Social networks, the 2016 US presidential election, and Kantian ethics: applying the categorical imperative to Cambridge Analytica’s behavioral microtargeting. Journal of Media Ethics, 33(3), 133-148.