Ahmed Shaami
Just about a couple of years back, Facebook was at the eighth position among the world’s ten most valuable brands in the global brand consultancy “Interbrand’s annual ranking” that consisted of the top 100 brands in the world.
Now, Facebook has lost its position from the top 10 best brands. Courtesy privacy scandals, investigations and people raising concerns about the world’s largest social networking site quickly, Facebook has fallen to the 14th spot this year.
It was once a “highly appreciated” brand with a lot of promise for growth but the company got into hot waters surrounded by numerous scandals and issues. Still not out of the woods, Apple, Google, Amazon, and Microsoft and Samsung are five other tech companies listed in the top 10.
Along with the 4 tech companies, Coca Cola, Toyota, Mercedes, McDonald, and Disney are now listed in top 10.
According to Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff, the social media networking giant is the “new cigarettes” and it makes kids addictive to the platform. He also said that it’s about time, the company must be held accountable now.
There are nearly 40 state attorneys general in the US who want to held facebook responsible for its anti-competitive business practices. Facebook has already agreed to pay $5 billion as a settlement to the US Trade Commission over privacy violations as it was not able to keep the user’s data secure.
According to a survey by Ponemon Institute in 2018, an independent research firm, people’s confidence in Facebook has taken a nose dive to 66 percent after the Cambridge Analytica data leak scandal that involved around 87 million users.
“We found that people care deeply about their privacy and when there is a mega data breach, as in the case of Facebook, people will express their concern. And some people will actually vote with their feet and leave,” Ponemon said in a statement.
