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Alexander Nix, former Cambridge Analytica chief, grilled by MPs – live
Alexander Nix accuses Channel 4 of 'destroying' Cambridge Analytica – live
(35 minutes later)
Collins turns to the claims that an Israeli intelligence firm worked alongside Cambridge Analytica in its campaigns in Nigeria. Was Nix aware of that?
Nix: “This is another groundless accusation that I believe was made by Mr Wylie. He suggests that this is something that has been reported to the authorities ,so while it would be tempting to talk through with you, this is another area that I can’t discuss.”
Collins now quotes from a transcript of the Channel 4 report: Channel 4 asked if Nix had worked with Black Cube, and Nix said yes. Nix now recants that, and says he was completely mistaken.
Nix has “not knowingly” worked with former or current Israeli officers, he says.
Collins notes he may not have been aware of someone else in his company doing it, and Nix replies pointing out that all he meant is that one cannot tell who is and isn’t an intelligence officer: “You might be an intelligence officer right now,” he says to Collins.
Collins asks Nix whether CA has worked in South America, specifically Argentina. “As I said last time, we don’t generally like to talk about specific clients, because there’s confidentiality there.”
Collins asks if it was an anti-Kirchner campaign. Nix says he doesn’t believe it was. Collins reads from a note he was handed, which Nix says suggests that he pitched for an anti-Kirchner campaign (implying that he didn’t win that particular pitch).
Collins reads from another note, that mentions Russia. Nix is confused, and asks to see the note – not happening, says Collins.
“We’ve never worked for a Russian client, or had anyone Russian working for us.”
O’Hara accuses Nix of playing the victim, to which Nix responds: What if we were the victim? What if none of this was true? What if we were just the guys who contributed to the Trump campaign, were wrongly linked with Brexit, and as a result, the global liberal media took umbrage with us and launched a co-ordinated campaign to destroy out business?
O’Hara: “So, you are the victim in all this?
Nix: ““If you’re sitting where I am right now you’d probably feel quite victimised.”
Brendan O’Hara, SNP, quotes from Channel 4’s response to Nix’s claim of misleading editing: Nix was recorded saying that the stings and honeytraps “could be done and had been done.”
Nix says when he said they “had been done”, he meant by other companies, not by Cambridge Analytica. “I didn’t commit to doing anything for them, I simply played along and listened to this potential client’s desires.”
O’Hara: “Surely any reasonable person would think that was an offer?”
Nix: “You don’t need to sit there and sully my reputation; I’ve already done that, to a worldwide audience… yes, it was foolish of me, and it was a well-crafted entrapment, sting, whatever you want to call it. Channel 4 got their man.”
Nix: “I take exception to the fact that Christopher Wylie can point blank lie to you, as he’s lied on many issues, and yet I’m sitting here and being subjected to frankly ridiculous accusations based on the most tenuous claims that are simply not supported by evidence.”
Ian Lucas asks who introduced Cambridge Analytica to Arron Banks. After a long pause, Lucas prompts: Brittany Kaiser said it was Steve Bannon. Nix agrees, saying it may well have been, he can’t remember.
“Banks and Bannon,” Lucas says, “have been involved in two of the most important elections in recent years. It’s very small world, in which Cambridge Analytica is a very prominent player. The assertion that Cambridge Analytica had nothing to do with the election is nonsense.”
Nix explodes: “The fact is, there is no evidence to support your position. What you are doing is building a conspiracy theory.”
The Channel 4 report, Nix says, “wasn’t my finest hour… chapeau to Channel 4 for destroying an excellent British technology company.”
Farrelly asks Nix which is true: is it a shadow political game-changer, as he has told political operatives, or a boring toothpaste advertiser, as he is now telling parliament?
Nix says both are true: once it was the first, but towards the end of its life, it was the latter.
Nix again attacks Wylie, who said that Cambridge Analytica played a “pivotal” role in Brexit. “It is deeply troubling that this conspiracy theory has spread so widely, and caused such damage to our company.”
Nix quotes from the Electoral Commission that found that Cambridge Analytica did no work for Leave.EU.
Nix quotes from the Electoral Commission that found that Cambridge Analytica did no work for Leave.EU.
Simon Hart, Conservative, quotes Nigel Oakes describing the works as the “backbone” of Leave.EU’s campaign, saying it “provided a proof of concept” for the work. Nix demurs, noting that Oakes doesn’t know Cambridge Analytica that well: “Apart from my close personal relationship with him, he could have been a stranger.”
Simon Hart, Conservative, quotes Nigel Oakes describing the works as the “backbone” of Leave.EU’s campaign, saying it “provided a proof of concept” for the work. Nix demurs, noting that Oakes doesn’t know Cambridge Analytica that well: “Apart from my close personal relationship with him, he could have been a stranger.”
Farrelly turns to Kaiser’s testimony that CA pitched work to Aaron Banks’ insurance companies. Nix says he is unaware of those pitches, and that they lead to no work.
Farrelly turns to Kaiser’s testimony that CA pitched work to Aaron Banks’ insurance companies. Nix says he is unaware of those pitches, and that they lead to no work.
(Banks will be testifying himself on Tuesday, to answer some of these questions in his own inimitable style.)
(Banks will be testifying himself on Tuesday, to answer some of these questions in his own inimitable style.)
“Do you know what use was made of the work you did for UKIP?”
“We never handed over any work to UKIP.”
“Do you know what use was made of the work you did for UKIP?”
“…no?”
“Do you know what use was made of the work you did for UKIP?”
“I’m afraid I don’t understand the question.”
Farrelly follows up by showing Nix an invoice from Cambridge Analytica to UKIP. How, he asks, does that work square with Nix’s statements about a lack of interest in UK politics.
“You’re really scratching round here,” Nix says. “We do 8, 9 elections around the world every year, and we’ve never done an election in the UK, so I stand by my statement that it’s not a target market.” The referendum, he says, was unique, which is why it was interested in the work, but it didn’t actually carry it out, he says.
“The committee was satisfied,” Nix says, “that we didn’t do any work for Leave.EU.”
We’re back, and conversation is turning to Brexit. Farrelly quotes Nix saying CA has never worked on UK campaigns, out of concern for British staff members.
Farrelly quotes from a pitch document, from CA’s pitch to Leave.EU, that proposed targeting adverts for donations overseas. WAs Nix advised this was legal?
Nix says he thought that soliciting donations from British nationals overseas was legal, but that it was unclear, and that in any event the work was not carried out.
While the Committee takes a break, here’s Channel 4’s response to Nix’s allegation that he fell prey to their “dark arts”:
Channel 4 News responds to Alexander Nix's comments to MPs in Parliament today https://t.co/30ygNMPSWo pic.twitter.com/CYmkHugHqD
Nix returns to his attack on Wylie: “He went around America pitching his business. My point is you have an individual, claiming to be a whistleblower… who purports to be a protector of data sovereignty but who actually acquired a significantly larger dataset than ours, and then went and tried to commercialise it in exactly the same way we did, and then spent the last two or three years getting bitter and jealous.”
Farrelly jumps in, knocking Nix’s break back further. Did Nix mislead over how useful GSR data was?
Nix says he did not. “That data was less useful than simply using Facebook’s own advertising algorithms.”
Farrelly: “It’s an interesting exercise in semantics.”
Nix: “No, it’s not… that data was less useful than we’d hoped.” Nix again notes that this avenue of questioning relies on testimony from Chris Wylie to the contrary.
Farrelly points out that the data which Nix dismissed in February as “fruitless research” was actually used in CA’s work in the US.
Nix: “I urge you, whilst I take a break, to revisit the testimony of Dr Kogan. He was extremely articulate in explaining how this data was modelled… the data was ultimately fruitless.”
Collins pushes back, pointing out that regardless of how useful the research was, a lot of it was delivered, and a second contract was signed. “Given the substance of the work that was done, to say it was fruitless clearly doesn’t reflect your view at the time.
“When we asked these questions initially, people chose to gloss over information they perhaps should have disclosed.”
Nix: “You will recall that when I appeared before you, the issue of Facebook data was not a sensational news story…”
(Ian Lucas: “Because you didn’t tell us about it!”)
Nix: “I gave you as much attention on it as you gave it yourselves. Clearly things have changed in the last three months.”
Collins: “What we asked you was pretty clear, and you chose not to talk about any of this.” Collins adds that Facebook, too, didn’t fully answer questions the first time the company appeared, only being fully open once it was quizzed after the information had already entered the public domain.
One last question, from Rebecca Pow, before a short break: who is the “team” that Nix refers to occasionally? Nix says they are his former colleagues, who he asks for advice from as a friend.
Pow adds a second question, noting that there’s another discrepancy, between Kaiser and Nix’s testimony about how Facebook surveys worked for Cambridge Analytica. “My former colleagues assured me that my original testimony was accurate… my understanding is that no data was collected.”
He refrains from continuing further, because again this topic falls under the investigation from the ICO.
Finally, Nix addresses the number, 87 million people, whose data was harvested by GSR. “What Dr Kogan made amply clear is that while he collected data from 87m people… Cambridge Analytica only received data on about 20m people in the USA. The only person to receive the entire dataset, which I believe Dr Kogan said was 96% more data than that which Cambridge Analytica received, was Christopher Wylie.
“A lot of the allegations, 90% of the allegations, that gained traction in the media have all come from a single source: Mr Wylie. If you permit me, I would just like to give a little bit of background. Where so many allegations have been made, and so many of them have been proven to be false.”
(Pow interjects to note that Wylie was in the UK on an exceptional talent visa. “If he went on to change his status, I can’t speak to that.”)
“Christopher Wylie was at the company for ten months, and he was instrumental in defining the relationship with Dr Kogan. As that business grew, he became more and more resentful, to the point of openly discussing with clients that he wanted to build a competitor to Cambridge Analytica without Nix – that is, without me.
“He developed a pitch that he took to Silicon Valley… He was totally agnostic about where the money came from… One San Francisco-based investor—” Nix is cut off by Collins, who asks how this is relevant.
“What we have is not Christopher Wylie’s opinion, but documents,” Collins says. “That’s what we’re basing our questions on. Evidence that you do not dispute.”
Collins asks whether, given technical evidence showing that audience files were shared between SCL and AIQ, Nix’s claims the two weren’t involved with each other stand up.
Nix says that working on the same data doesn’t mean that two companies are intertwined. “That would be dealt with the contract with us.”
“My data team assured me that there was no raw data that went in to the Ripon platform,” Nix adds.
One last question from Farrelly: “You had a staffer from your company working on data from Breitbart… was any data gathered from that secondment to Breitbart, and if so how would that have been used by the company?”
Nix “can’t think of anyone who was seconded to Breitbart… I haven’t heard about that before.”
Nix, at this point, refuses to answer further questions on further matters relating to GSR and Facebook data, based on the ICO investigation.
“The ICO took advantage of my parliamentary privilege last time I was here to use my testimony as part of their application to search my premises. Clearly my privilege is not as absolute.
“The committee should be reacting to findings from the ICO and not the other way round,” Nix adds.
Collins points out that none of this is in front of courts, and that the ICO is fine with Nix talking, but he’s happy to drop it.
