NEW DELHI: British consultancy firm Cambridge Analytica's partner website in India has been suspended amid controversy over its role in the breach of data involving 50 million Facebook users.

According to the Times of India, the account of Ovleno Business Intelligence, which it said was an affiliate of the British firm was suspended on Wednesday (Mar 21) night.



The BBC reported that according to SCL India, which is owned by SCL group and Ovleno Business, India's two major political parties - Congress and the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party - are clients of the firm.

But both parties have denied any links with SCL India, the BBC added.

India's information technology minister on Wednesday warned against any abuse of social media in elections, following reports that Cambridge Analytica accessed information on millions of Facebook users to target US voters.

India is due to hold a national election in 2019 and several states will elect new assemblies this year and next.



"Abuse of social media including Facebook cannot be allowed to impact the fairness of elections," Ravi Shankar Prasad told reporters.

"In the wake of recent data theft from Facebook, let my stern warning be heard across the Atlantic, far away in California. Any covert or overt attempt to misuse social media including Facebook to influence India's electoral process through undesirable means will neither be tolerated, nor be permitted."

Facebook said Prasad had raised several important questions and the company appreciates his attention to this matter.

"We will continue to engage with the government on this matter. We are committed to vigorously enforcing our policies to protect peoples' information and will take whatever steps are required that this happens," the company said in a statement.

Cambridge Analytica has denied media accusations that it improperly accessed millions of Facebook users' information and said it deleted the data after learning that it did not adhere to data protection rules.

Facebook has said it has tightened its controls on such practices since it discovered the alleged abuses by Cambridge Analytica in 2015.