Crimson Hexagon’s apps are reportedly being suspended from Facebook and its Instagram unit as part of an investigation led by the Menlo Park giant over the Boston company's practices of collecting and sharing public data.
“Crimson Hexagon is fully cooperating with Facebook, who has publicly stated its investigation to date has found no wrongdoing,” Chris Bingham, CTO of Crimson Hexagon, said in a prepared statement.
On Friday, the WSJ reported that Crimson Hexagon had contracts to analyze public Facebook data for clients including a Russian nonprofit and multiple U.S. government agencies. Facebook told the WSJ that it wasn’t aware of some of the contracts, which weren’t approved by Facebook in advance. As a result, the social media giant is launching a "broad inquiry" into how Crimson Hexagon stores user data.
In a Friday blog post, Crimson Hexagon explained that it only collects publicly available social media data that anyone can access, and does not collect private social media data.
The local social media analytics company (whose name is inspired by Jorge Luis Borges) uses AI to get consumer insights from public data pulled from social media, including Facebook.
Co-founded in 2007 by Harvard professor Gary King, Crimson Hexagon has raised more than $33 million from Sageview Capital and other investors.
