VIDEO: Awkward! Facebook VP stumped by BBC question

Elliot Schrage, Facebook’s VP Public Policy, was struck dumb by BBC reporter Emily Maitlis when she quizzed him about the ethics of “Sponsored Stories” on Facebook in a television documentary shown this weekend in the UK.

News reporter Maitlis raised the issue of Facebook’s ethics – if you click “Like” on a company or product page on Facebook (26 million people have done so for Starbucks, for example) then your name and photograph could unwittingly appear in online adverts for those products for all your friends to see.

Unfortunately, Facebook provides no way to opt out of appearing in these “adverts”…

Read more in my article on the Naked Security website.

Found this article interesting? Follow Graham Cluley on Twitter or Mastodon to read more of the exclusive content we post.

Graham Cluley •   @gcluley

Graham Cluley is a veteran of the cybersecurity industry, having worked for a number of security companies since the early 1990s when he wrote the first ever version of Dr Solomon's Anti-Virus Toolkit for Windows. Now an independent analyst, he regularly makes media appearances and is an international public speaker on the topic of cybersecurity, hackers, and online privacy. Follow him on Twitter, Mastodon, Bluesky, or drop him an email.