Mark Zuckerberg named as defendant in Facebook privacy suit

Washington D.C. Attorney General Karl Racine has added Mark Zuckerberg to a lawsuit against Facebook over consumer privacy violations related to the Cambridge Analytica scandal.

“Our continuing investigation revealed that he was personally involved in decisions related to Cambridge Analytica and Facebook’s failure to protect user data,” Racine said of the decision to name Zuckerberg in the suit.

Racine noted that his office has reviewed “hundreds of thousands” of documents and conducted numerous depositions with former employees since filing the suit in 2018.

The D.C. AG filed the suit in 2018 following revelations that the company allowed British political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica to collect profile data on more than 50 million Facebook users without their consent.

The decision to name Zuckerberg is notable due to the fact that it could expose the Facebook founder to personal liability for the first time in a suit brought by a government entity in the U.S.

“This lawsuit is about protecting the data of half of all District residents and tens of millions of people across the country,” Racine said. “We’ve taken our obligation to investigate wrongdoing very seriously — and Facebook should take its responsibility to protect users just as seriously.”