Thread by @LFDodds

EXCLUSIVE:

Remember last week when I profiled NationBuilder, the election software used by both Boris Johnson and Donald Trump?

Well, it turns out NB has been buying voters' data from a company accused by Facebook of vioolating its users' privacy.

telegraph.co.uk/technology/201…

That company, FullContact, was investigated by Facebook alongside Cambridge Analytica in 2016 & apparently found to have broken rules.

When contacted by the Telegraph, FullContact denied all wrongdoing – and then said it would delete all its Facebook data to avoid "confusion".

So what exactly is going on? In case you missed it, here's my thread from last week on NB – an incredibly prolific software service which was used by both sides of the EU referendum, by Tommy Robinson and by up to 200 groups in the 2017 general election.

https://twitter.com/LFDodds/status/1170439978226089984

One of NB's more contentious features, described by @ICOnews as "of concern", is social media matching. By default, customers who upload lists of voters' email addresses will automatically receive the Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn accounts associated with those addresses.

NationBuilder freely informed me that this service was powered by FullContact, a data marketing firm based in Colorado.

But eagle-eyed readers of last month's Cambridge Analytica document dump will remember FullContact from this internal Facebook communication.

So wait, has NationBuilder been buying Facebook data that was supposed to have been deleted in 2016?

FullContact denies this. A spokesman claimed that FB only asked it to remove the data from /one/ of its services, and allowed it to keep the data for later selling to NB.

FullContact also vigorously denied that it had ever violated Facebook's rules, maintaining instead that it /voluntarily/ removed the data.

A spokesman for Facebook, meanwhile, insisted that in its view FullContact had broken its rules!

Yeah, your guess is as good as mine.

FullContact has now said it will delete all its Facebook data, meaning NationBuilder's customers will lose access to social media matching.

But the question remains: how many British politicians have bought Facebook data, via NationBuilder, from this company under suspicion?

Just as a reminder, NB's past customers include but are not limited to:
👁 Emmanuel Macron
👁 Tommy Robinson
👁 The People's Vote campaign
👁 Both sides of the EU referendum
👁 Momentum
👁 The Labour Party

I encourage you read the full story here.

telegraph.co.uk/technology/201…

(You will also see me gamely responding in the comments with a reader who feels that I am baiting conservative readers by putting Boris Johnson in the headline instead of the SNP.

I promise I only put him in the headline becasue he's the prime minister!)

Anyway, as before, if you have any further tips about this sort of thing, my DMs and email inbox are always open...

https://twitter.com/LFDodds/status/1170454569110757376