The rapid growth continues, and Facebook has found a solid modus operandi: it’s better to add than to compete. In 2010 Instagram appeared and, two years later, Facebook acquired it for a billion dollars. The same happened with WhatsApp, which was bought in 2014.
In 2016 the decline of its glory years began by being accused of racism for allowing “ethnicity” segmentation by creating ads on its platform. In addition, the elections in the United States of the same year were decisive in the history of this social network, but negatively, as it was pointed out by the lack of measures to eradicate fake news.
However, the problem that ended up forever tarnishing Facebook’s reputation was the Cambridge Analytica case, a consulting firm that used the information of 87 million Facebook users to create electoral campaigns by creating psychological profiles. This, in addition to being a big scandal for US politics and for the digital world, dimensioned the scope and influence that the social network has at a global level thanks to the amount of sensitive information that users decide to share.
What is certain is that the history of the Internet could not be told without the history of Facebook and its influence on human communication is unprecedented. However, it is important to remember that, at 18 years old, Facebook is still a young company that continues to update to remain current. Thus, the shift to Meta by the corporation is the beginning of great developments for the digital world, where Mark Zuckerberg could try to make up for his faults with the security of his users.