Here's a state-by-state breakdown of Facebook users impacted by the Cambridge Analytica scandal
Earlier this year, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg sat in front of lawmakers and answered questions about the role his company played in a data privacy scandal that affected tens of millions of Americans.
The scandal involved data analytics company Cambridge Analytica, which obtained information from 87 million unknowing Facebook users, and then used that data to try and sway the 2016 presidential election after it was hired by the Trump campaign.
Facebook says it was under the impression that Cambridge Analytica deleted that data back in 2015, but in March of this year, the company's founder came forward to say that it was still in possession of it all. Furious with Facebook's lack of caution, users and lawmakers all over the world have been demanding to know how this happened.
The 87 million users reportedly received a notification in the days leading up to Zuckerberg's US hearings, alerting them that their data had been compromised, but senators also asked Facebook to provide a more precise and comprehensive geographical breakdown. It seems Facebook quietly shared one in an update to an April newsroom post last month, which Business Insider found in the company's responses to lawmakers' questions posted by the US Senate earlier this week.
Facebook has previously stated that about 70 million of the affected users were located in the US. Based on the list, it seems California and Texas are home to more of the users impacted by these events than any other state; in fact, the top 10 states on the most-impacted list were identical to 2017's 10 most populated states.
Taking a look at the percent of the population affected, however, tells us a much different story: Only 17% of California's 2017 population was impacted in the Cambridge Analytica scandal, while half of the population of the District of Columbia had its information compromised - more than any state on the map, by far.
After Washington D.C., the 1o states with the highest percentage of users impacted all voted for a Republican candidate in three or more of the last four elections, making them appropriate targets for the Trump campaign. And the three states with the lowest percentage of users impacted voted for Democratic candidates in at least three or more of the last four elections.
