Over the past few weeks, Facebook has been grappling with a massive data breach crisis. In 2015, Cambridge Analytica, a British data mining firm, was able to access data from 50 million Facebook users and used the data for political reasons. Once the U.S. presidential campaign ended, Cambridge Analytica claimed they deleted all of the data, which turned out to be untrue. After hundreds of thousands of users were upset at the scandal and threatened to leave the social media network, Facebook can now sigh in relief after a newly released report confirmed the only data Cambridge Analytica accessed during the campaign season was millions of minion memes.
Minion memes gained popularity on Facebook after the first Despicable Me movie was released in 2010. A typical minion meme features one or more minions, which are goofy yellow characters from the movies who speak in gibberish, along with a funny saying in the background that is relatable to a group of people in some way. The minion memes have been a hit among suburban moms who constantly share the memes on their Facebook pages.
“I can’t believe someone stole all my funny minion memes!” exclaimed Lincoln, NE native Sharon Smith, mother of two loving children and grandmother to three grandchildren. “I can’t believe Facebook would let hackers access my data! If they let those hackers take any of my personal information, I’m gonna dab on those haters, LOL! Watch me whip and nae-nae!”
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg spoke about the scandal in a recent press release.
“Thank God they didn’t take any sensitive information,” said Zuckerberg. “This really could have been a huge disaster. What a relief it is they only took the minion memes. Hopefully, they don’t find the millions of credit card numbers I put on Craigslist last night. Now THAT would be a disaster.”