Cambridge Analytica suspends CEO Alexander Nix
The Cambridge Analytica has suspended CEO Alexander Nix pending a full investigation following Channel 4’s undercover report, the company said in a statement Tuesday.
“In the view of the Board, Mr. Nix’s recent comments secretly recorded by Channel 4 and other allegations do not represent the values or operations of the firm and his suspension reflects the seriousness with which we view this violation,” the statement said.
The data firm’s chief data officer, Dr. Alexander Tayler, will serve as the acting CEO during the probe. The firm said it asked Julian Malins Q.C. investigate Nix’s comments.
In the report, Nix and two of his colleagues described a variety of underhanded methods they could use to influence elections, including but not limited to staging, filming and publishing fake bribery or sex worker stings against opponents, using former spies to conduct intelligence-gathering on political foes and various shades of online voter profiling.
Cambridge Analytica’s chief executive officer Alexander Nix gives an interview during the 2017 Web Summit in Lisbon on November 9, 2017. Europe’s largest tech event Web Summit is being held at Parque das Nacoes in Lisbon from November 6 to November 9.
PATRICIA DE MELO MOREIRA/AFP/Getty
