Durbin Questions Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg

Statement

U.S. Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin (D-IL) today questioned Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg during a joint hearing of the Senate Judiciary and Commerce Committees entitled "Facebook, Social Media Privacy, and the Use and Abuse of Data":

"Mr. Zuckerberg, would you be comfortable sharing with us the name of the hotel you stayed in last night?" Durbin asked.

"Um, uh, no," Zuckerberg replied.

"If you messaged anybody this week, would you share with us the names of the people you messaged?" asked Durbin.

"Senator, no, I would probably not choose to do that publicly here," said Zuckerberg.

"I think that may be what this is all about: your right to privacy--the limits of your right to privacy, and how much you give away in modern America in the name of, quote, connecting people around the world," added Durbin. "A question, basically, of what information Facebook is collecting, who they're sending it to, and whether they ever asked me in advance my permission to do that."

Durbin continued by asking Mr. Zuckerberg about a new service developed by Facebook called Messenger Kids, an application designed to allow children aged six to 12 to send video and text messages through Facebook as an extension of their parents' accounts. The full exchange can be found at the links below:

Video of Durbin's remarks in Committee are available here.

Audio of Durbin's remarks in Committee are available here.

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