“The general public itself has little or no interest in this Document that could warrant exposing Facebook to the risks that would inevitably accompany disclosure.” — Facebook

"Private emails could contradict Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg's sworn testimony about when Facebook learned about the Cambridge Analytica data breach," hacker-turned-reporter Kevin Poulsen writes at the Daily Beast, with Kelly Weill.

The Beast reports late Friday that Facebook and the attorney general of Washington, D.C. "are sparring over an internal email chain that allegedly shows Facebook employees discussing Cambridge Analytica data harvesting scandal in September 2015."

That would have been a few months before Facebook told lawmakers–and the rest of America– it learned that Cambridge Analytica, the dirty political data consulting firm founded by Trump backers, was grabbing information for millions of Facebook users without their knowledge or consent.

From the Daily Beast report:

Facebook and the attorney general are in court Friday to argue whether those emails can be viewed by the public. If unsealed, their contents might contradict sworn testimony Zuckerberg made before Congress last year. It's part of a lawsuit filed by D.C. Attorney General Karl Racine, accusing Facebook of failing to protect user data. Facebook claims it learned about Cambridge Analytica's dealings at the same time as the public, in December 2015. That's when the Guardian reported that Republican Sen. Ted Cruz's presidential campaign was using psychological profiles compiled from tens of millions of unwitting Facebook users' personal information. The data was mined by former psychology professor Aleksandr Kogan using a personality quiz. Kogan later sold the data to Cambridge Analytica, who hired him as a contractor in 2014.

More from the reporters and other journalists and observers on Twitter below.

Facebook's court brief details the extraordinary steps the company has taken to keep email about this second, unreported Cambridge Analytica incident from the public. pic.twitter.com/yQixvpW6Il — Kevin Poulsen (@kpoulsen) March 22, 2019

Starting soon: First major hearing in DC vs Facebook. Looming over today is Facebook's motion to dismiss plus a request from company to keep some emails under seal. Those emails purportedly show FB was aware of Cambridge related issues well before public knew. Phones off shortly. — Tony Romm (@TonyRomm) March 22, 2019

Facebook is going to court today to fight the release of emails that might contradict Zuckerberg's sworn testimony on Cambridge Analytica: https://t.co/ock0i6KDi1 — Kelly Weill (@KELLYWEILL) March 22, 2019

We're about to learn if Facebook didn't tell the whole truth about Cambridge Analytica https://t.co/53VTwNMtKj — Justin Miller (@justinjm1) March 22, 2019

Thread: Facebook has been giving publicly misleading answers on Cambridge Analytica and data harvesting since @harryfoxdavies first revealed it in 2015. No-one there has apologised for their serial untruths. The same people – two people – are directing that team. https://t.co/jlVhRX58B2 — James Ball (@jamesrbuk) March 22, 2019

At the time – and as Facebook execs were grilled by lawmakers here and across the Atlantic – one of the major questions for Facebook was: why didn't you ensure that Cambridge Analytica had deleted its data cache after the Guardian told you what was going on? — Julia Carrie Wong (@juliacarriew) March 22, 2019

It never actually made sense for Facebook to rely on a voluntary assertion from Cambridge Analytica that it would delete the Kogan data. It makes even less sense when you learn, 3.5 years later, that FB had already had concerns about CA https://t.co/O7MLbJcNDz — Julia Carrie Wong (@juliacarriew) March 22, 2019

But Facebook NEVER BOTHERED TO MENTION that it's own staff had heard rumors of an ENTIRELY SEPARATE data scraping effort by Cambridge Analytica three months before the Guardian informed them of the massive Kogan cache in December 2015 https://t.co/O7MLbJcNDz — Julia Carrie Wong (@juliacarriew) March 22, 2019