Facebook Co-Founder Says it's Time to Break up the Social Media Giant

• 05.10.2019, 10:22
•  World

RIA Novosti

Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes has called for the breakup of the social network, in an opinion piece in the New York Times, The CBC reports.

"We are a nation with a tradition of reining in monopolies, no matter how well-intentioned the leaders of these companies may be. Mark's power is unprecedented and un-American," Hughes wrote on Thursday, referring to Mark Zuckerberg, his former business partner and college roommate and the current chief executive officer of Facebook.

Facebook owns the largest social network, with more than two billion users across the world. It also owns WhatsApp, Messenger and Instagram, each used by more than one billion people.

Hughes co-founded Facebook in 2004 at Harvard University with Zuckerberg and Dustin Moskovitz. He quit Facebook in 2007 and later said in a LinkedIn post that he made $500 million for his three years of work.

"It's been 15 years since I co-founded Facebook at Harvard, and I haven't worked at the company in a decade," said Hughes, who later was an online strategist for Barack Obama during the 2008 U.S. presidential campaign.

"But I feel a sense of anger and responsibility."

"Facebook accepts that with success comes accountability. But you don't enforce accountability by calling for the breakup of a successful American company," Facebook spokesman Nick Clegg said in a statement.

"Accountability of tech companies can only be achieved through the painstaking introduction of new rules for the internet. That is exactly what Mark Zuckerberg has called for."