How Consumers Responded to The Cambridge Analytica Scandal

This research study aim is to explore consumers response and reaction patterns to the Cambridge Analytica scandal when they heard about it in the news. This research presents a case report of Cambridge Analytica Scandal, and through a netnogrpahy study shows how the Cambridge Analytica scandal has impacted consumers' perception and trust in using online platforms and has made consumers sceptical in engaging in online activities. The analysis of Quora and Twitter discussions immediately after the scandal revealed two groups of users: those for whom data privacy was a concern and those who were not concerned about their data privacy. The consumers on Quora with data privacy concerns comprised 47% (14/30) of the study group whereas consumers for whom data privacy was not a concern were 53% (16/30) of the study group.

However, the study result on Twitter gives an opposite opinion about the results compared to the results on Quora. On Twitter the participants who expressed concerns for their data privacy were 26/30 (87%) and those who expressed less concern were only 4/30 (13%). These results show that overwhelming participants who expressed data privacy concerns were more than 6 times those participants in the study who expressed less concern for their data privacy. This means that a significant proportion of online users and their concerns cannot be ignored by online service providers and social network owners. Therefore, addressing consumers worries about data privacy risks should be an urgent priority for service providers who want to prevent users from leaving their platforms.