Users' data are the lifeblood of Facebook, and if they wanted to opt out of all of the platform's data-driven advertising, they would have to pay for it, Sheryl Sandberg, the company's chief operating officer, told NBC News on Thursday.

In an interview with "Today" co-anchor Savannah Guthrie, Sandberg again acknowledged that the company mishandled the breach that allowed Cambridge Analytica, the data analysis firm that worked with Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign, to harvest millions of users' information.

"It is definitely the case in 2016 that we were behind and we didn't understand that kind of election interference," Sandberg said.

Following the interview, Facebook clarified that the company does not offer a pay model for the social network and that Sandberg was only speaking in hypothetical terms.



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