Rep. Billy Long confronts Zuckerberg on “FaceMash”:
Long: “You put up pictures of two women and decide which one is the better, more attractive of the two?”
Zuckerberg: “Congressmen, that is an accurate description of the prank website that I made when I was a sophomore.” pic.twitter.com/YxRWdn3C01
— Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) April 11, 2018
During his second day of testimony in front of Congress, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg (a.k.a. “Mr. Zuckerman“) told the House Energy and Commerce Committee that he was one of the 87 million people affected by Cambridge Analytica’s data breach of Facebook. Whatever sympathy that engendered among the committee members didn’t last long, as Zuckerberg was later questioned about past invasions of privacy.
Missouri Republican Rep. Billy Long asked the 33-year-old during the line of questioning whether or not FaceSmash, the women-ranking site Zuckerberg started prior to Facebook which had used Harvard’s school directory, was still operational.
Zuckerberg described FaceSmash as “a prank website that I launched in my dorm room,” and then went on to imply that The Social Network, David Fincher’s dramatized account of the creation of Facebook, obscured the truth and that the two were not connected in any way.
Rep. Long pointed out that the timing seems awfully coincidental, but Zuckerberg remained steadfast that the two were unrelated. The congressman then went on to hypothetically describe FaceSmash as the site “where you put up pictures of two women and decide which one is the better, more attractive of the two?”
The query forced Zuckerberg to gather himself for a beat before confirming. “Congressman, that is an accurate description of the prank website that I made when I was a sophomore,” he insisted.