(Bloomberg) -- Lawmakers' questions for Mark Zuckerberg on Wednesday included whether a lack of diversity among Facebook Inc. workers left the social media giant blind to Russian attempts to inflame minority groups during the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
"I'm concerned that there are not eyes that are culturally competent looking at these things," said Representative Yvette Clarke, a New York Democrat. She asked whether “the lack of diversity -- culturally competent personnel in your C-suite and throughout your organization" -- kept Facebook from detecting Russian attempts to incite racial and religious divisions.
"I agree that we need to work on diversity,” Zuckerberg replied. "In this specific case I don't think that that was the issue.” Facebook was “‘frankly slow” in identifying “the whole Russian information operation and not just that specific example,” he said.
Facebook will seek to address the issue by identifying foreign actors and keeping them from running political ads, Zuckerberg said.
To contact the reporter on this story: Todd Shields in Washington at tshields3@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Jon Morgan at jmorgan97@bloomberg.net, Molly Schuetz, Jillian Ward
©2018 Bloomberg L.P.
Essential Business Intelligence, Continuous LIVE TV, Sharp Market Insights, Practical Personal Finance Advice and Latest Stories — On NDTV Profit.
