Finance

A Facebook investor decided to ‘quarantine’ the company amid the Cambridge Analytica data scandal

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is seen on stage during a town hall at Facebook’s headquarters in Menlo Park, California September 27, 2015.
REUTERS/Stephen Lam/File Photo

  • Facebook investor Nordea will not invest further in the company, which is struggling with a data scandal involving Cambridge Analytica.
  • Facebook shares have declined 10% since Friday to $168.15.

LONDON — Nordea, one of the biggest banks in the Nordics, will not invest any more money in Facebook, amid a public backlash against the company for its involvement with political consultancy Cambridge Analytica.

Sasja Beslik, head of group sustainable finance at Nordea, said in a tweet on Wednesday that the firm would “quarantine” its investments in Facebook “for the time being.”

Here’s the tweet:

Beslik said in a follow-up tweet: “Given the high-level revelations and the turmoil surrounding the company with a strong public backlash, coupled with the overhanging threat of increasing regulation of the platforms and the EU GDPR on the horizon, we choose to quarantine Facebook.”

Last week a whistleblower from Cambridge Analytica said that the consultancy took data from Facebook users to target voters and influence democratic votes.

The personal information of around 50 million Facebook users was used to build “psychographic” profiles of voters and to target them with manipulative ads in support of its clients, including Donald Trump.

Facebook says that it was duped by CA, which promised to delete the data after Facebook discovered its activities in 2015.

Facebook’s stock has slid 10% since the news surfaced and the #deletefacebook hashtag has been trending among some users, upset about the privacy violation.

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