British regulators on Friday began searching the London offices of Cambridge Analytica (CA), the scandal-hit communications firm at the heart of the Facebook data scandal, shortly after a judge approved a search warrant.
Around 18 enforcement agents from the office of Information Commissioner Elizabeth Denham entered the company’s London headquarters at around 8:00pm to execute the warrant.
The High Court granted the raid request less than an hour earlier, as Denham investigates claims that Cambridge Analytica may have illegally harvested Facebook data for political ends.
A full explanation of the legal ruling by Judge Anthony James Leonard will be issued on Tuesday, according to the court.
“We’re pleased with the decision of the judge,” Denham’s office said on Twitter.
“This is just one part of a larger investigation into the use of personal data and analytics for political purposes,” it added in a statement.
“As you will expect, we will now need to collect, assess and consider the evidence before coming to any conclusions.”
Brittany Kaiser, CA’s business development director until two weeks ago, revealed it conducted data research for Leave.EU, one of the leading campaign groups, via the UK Independence Party (UKIP), according to The Guardian.
– ‘I was lying’ –
Kaiser, 30, told the newspaper she felt the company’s repeated public denials it ever worked on the poll misled British lawmakers and the public.
“In my opinion, I was lying,” she said. “In my opinion I felt like we should say, ‘this is exactly what we did.'”
CA’s suspended chief executive Alexander Nix told MPs last month: “We did not work for Leave.EU. We have not undertaken any paid or unpaid work for them, OK?”
Nix was suspended this week following the Facebook revelations and a further media sting in which he boasts about entrapping politicians and secretly operating in elections around the world through shadowy front companies.
He has already been called to reappear before British lawmakers to explain “inconsistencies” in past testimony about the firm’s use of the data.
Meanwhile Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg has been forced to issue a statement outlining his firm’s role in the scandal and apologised Wednesday to its billions of users for the breach.
