Elon Musk has deleted the official Facebook pages of SpaceX and Tesla this Friday after receiving #DeleteFacebook challenge from some of his followers. Currently, both pages with millions of fans are unavailable to visitors.
SpaceX is an aerospace manufacturer and space transport services company while Tesla, Inc. (formerly Tesla Motors) is a firm that specializes in electric vehicles, solar panel manufacturing, and energy storage. Both are based in Palo Alto, California and owned by Musk.
It all started when Elon Musk started a conversation with WhatsApp co-founder Brian Acton who a couple of days ago advised Facebook users to delete their account permanently amid Cambridge Analytica scandal.
What’s Facebook?
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 23, 2018
“Delete SpaceX page on Facebook if you’re the man?” said one Twitter user to Elon Musk. In his response, Musk replied “I didn’t realize there was one. Will do.”
I didn’t realize there was one. Will do.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 23, 2018
And minutes later, SpaceX and Tesla, Inc’s Facebook pages were deleted and unavailable for users. Here is a screenshot showing the error message “sorry this content isn’t available right now” on both pages.
The #DeleteFacebook movement gained momentum after it was reported that Facebook secretly provided access to 50 million users profiles to a British data mining firm Cambridge Analytica who also worked on President Trump’s election campaign.
Cambridge Analytica is accused of using those profiles to extract data to influence Brexit campaign and the 2016 presidential election campaign.
However, as for Elon Musk, he may have to face another challenge soon as Space X (3 million followers) and Tesla’s Instagram account (4.1 million followers) are still up and running. Since Instagram is also owned by Facebook it will be interesting to see if someone challenges Musk again or not.
Nevertheless, Facebook is in hot water for playing with its user’s privacy and Mark Zuckerberg has some thinking to do.
