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Mark Zuckerberg could be summoned to testify by UK officials

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Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg may be summoned to speak to UK politicians whenever he visits the country next.

According to a letter addressed to Facebook UK’s head of pubic policy Rebecca Stimson, sent by the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee, Facebook’s CTO Mike Schroepfer failed to provide full answers to some of the questions when he appeared before UK parliament last week as part of an inquiry into fake news.

It’s for this reason that lawmakers, specifically Damian Collins, the Committee chair are now requesting that Zuckerberg gives evidence in person. 

Collins has asked for Zuckerberg to appear in person and take questions from UK politicians in the same way he did for US Congress last month.

In the letter, Collins reinforced the need for the tech billionaire to travel to the UK to testify and to do so before 24th May – which is when Zuckerberg is expected to provide evidence in the European Parliament.

“It is worth noting that, while Mr Zuckerberg does not normally come under the jurisdiction of the UK Parliament, he will do so next time he enters the country,” Collins’s letter reads.

“We hope that he will respond positively to our request, but if not the Committee will resolve to issue a formal summons for him to appear when he is next in the UK.”

In the letter, Collins highlighted almost 40 points on which Schroepfer failed to answer the questions he was posed. These included questions on Facebook’s financial profit from dark ads, third-party app developers, foreign interference and advertising spend in elections.

The CTO was also probed on the storage and privacy of user data.

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