Apple's Tim Cook Slams Zuckerberg Over Facebook's Privacy Profiteering
Social media network Facebook, which has recently come under fire over its handling of user data, has now been harshly criticized by Apple CEO Tim Cook.
According to Cook, detailed profiles of individuals compiled by internet platforms should not exist.
In an interview with tech news website Recode and MSNBC, he said that he would prefer if Facebook and others would have curbed their use of personal data to build "these detailed profiles of people… patched together from several sources."
"We could make a ton of money if we monetized our customers, if our customers were our product," Cook said. "We've elected not to do that… We're not going to traffic in your personal life. Privacy to us is a human right, a civil liberty."
Cook also said that it is past time to regulate Facebook, claiming "the best regulation is no regulation, is self-regulation." He added: "However, I think we're beyond that here."
In the current Cambridge Analytica scandal, the personal information of 50 million American Facebook users was reportedly used by the political consulting firm without the individuals' consent.
Concerns over mass data collection by Facebook and Google have been voiced by the Apple CEO for years. Cook has pointed out the distinction between Apple's business model of selling products to customers for a profit, and that of internet platforms that are "gobbling up everything they can learn about you and trying to monetize it."
When asked what he would do if he were Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, the executive said: "I wouldn't be in this situation."
On Friday, another Silicon Valley CEO, Elon Musk, deleted the Facebook pages of two of his companies, Tesla and SpaceX.
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