This is a wake-up call for a generation. The revelation of Cambridge Analytica’s manipulation of Facebook data to target American voters on behalf of Donald Trump in 2016 shines a torch on the jungle where we have become prey for the online carnivores to which we reveal our secrets.

The chairman of the Commons culture committee yesterday called on Facebook’s warlord, 33-year-old multi-billionaire Mark Zuckerberg, to attend personally to give evidence about his company’s behaviour, though there seems more chance of an appearance by Vladimir Putin.

The rulers of Silicon Valley have more money than most national exchequers. They seem beyond reach of any fiscal jurisdiction — the tech industry’s overall global tax payments have fallen to 9 per cent of profits — or of ethical restraint. While Google and its subsidiary YouTube spasmodically claim a willingness to review their data protection policies, Facebook merely stonewalls.

Its executives, and Zuckerberg himself, mechanically mumble the mantra that they do nothing illegal, and keep counting the money. There are 32 million Facebook users in Britain — half the population — and two billion worldwide.

The revelation of Cambridge Analytica’s manipulation of Facebook data to target American voters on behalf of Donald Trump in 2016 shines a torch on the jungle where we have become prey for the online carnivores to which we reveal our secrets (file photo)

The skinny young megalomaniac who controls the company knows he holds knowledge that makes him more powerful than any dictator, the wielder of greater influence than was Henry Ford with his cars; John Paul Getty with his oil; Andrew Carnegie atop his steel monopoly.

Zuckerberg knows the secrets of our hearts, which he and his Silicon Valley kin can sell for billions to anyone who wants to swing an election, market a product, pervert the thinking of a nation.

Cambridge Analytica’s managing director Mark Turnbull was secretly filmed by Channel 4 News describing the operations of his firm, which is part-owned by a Trump-supporting billionaire: ‘We just put information into the bloodstream of the internet, and then watch it grow, give it a little push every now and again . . . like a remote control.’

Because the internet has grown from a niche activity for geeks into a transformative culture within a mere two or three decades, we are still striving to understand it. It is hard to devise enforceable regulation on corporate entities that are almost invisible, and have most of their being a continent away.

We can raise an anguished cry of ‘it ought not to be allowed!’, but Western democracies must tread carefully. We want to avoid following the paths taken by China and Russia, which exploit draconian internet controls to sustain dictatorships and foreclose free speech.

Yet the exposure of Cambridge Analytica, and of Facebook which provided the forum for an online personality quiz to which 270,000 respondents told all about their lives, tastes and habits, should alert every citizen, young and old.

Teenagers, especially, might ask themselves: would you reveal a fraction so much information to a school group, a friend, a parent? How can you kid yourself that laying bare your life online is safer? Kids, who would not hesitate to tell a prudent lie to grown-ups in their own homes, for some perverse reason tell the truth to Facebook friends.

Yet even those of us who spurn social media are almost as vulnerable. Every day that we place things online, Amazon bombards us with come-ons that emphasise its omniscience about what we read, watch, spread on the garden, use in the house.

Zuckerberg knows the secrets of our hearts, which he and his Silicon Valley kin can sell for billions to anyone who wants to swing an election, market a product, pervert the thinking of a nation (file photo)

Phone companies, along with Google and every other net provider, hold extraordinary records of where we go; whom we talk to, meet, love, hate.

Cambridge Analytica’s gift to the Trump victory appears to have been to empower his campaign to target ‘persuadable voters’, sparing canvassers from wasting effort on irreconcilable Democrats.

It has been said for centuries that knowledge is power, yet Hitler’s Gestapo and Stalin’s secret police knew far less about their fellow citizens than does Facebook, which doesn’t have to photograph them outside their home, tap their phones, or steal government files. Spies seem redundant in the net age.

What matters for us now is to move beyond shock and disgust about the Cambridge Analytica-Facebook revelations, and consider what can be done to make such companies behave better.

They are unlikely to develop ethics of their own accord: such people as Zuckerberg see themselves as the new masters of the universe, possessed of a hubris that makes President Trump seem modest.

We shall have better behaviour only when we have more accountability, such as at present is non-existent.

Stephanie Hare, a tech expert in the data field, said of the Cambridge Analytica story: ‘What is really striking here is the absence of any oversight.’ Nobody in the social network, the data company or the political researchers acknowledged any responsibility to ask if data was being unethically shared.

Investigating and, if appropriate, charging the bosses of Cambridge Analytica will be the easy part, because they are based in Britain.

If, as is quite plausible, it is found that their actions have broken no law, parliament, and the information regulators, must start thinking hard about new rules, new laws.

It would be a start to oblige all those who make online statements to identify themselves. Only if, and when, means can be found to do this can those who spread falsehoods be made liable to sanctions, starting with libel law. Companies which seek to intervene in politics, and especially elections, should be obliged to show their colours.

But Britain is an outlying island in the social media universe, figuratively as well as geographically. The internet barons can only be regulated through international action, in which the U.S. must be the lead party, because its citizens are the dominant players.

Yet even those of us who spurn social media are almost as vulnerable. Every day that we place things online, Amazon bombards us with come-ons that emphasise its omniscience about what we read, watch, spread on the garden, use in the house (file photo)

It is welcome that the U.S. Federal Trade Commission yesterday announced an investigation into Zuckerberg’s empire, following the British revelations.

The Washington Post calls this ‘the most substantial political and legal threat yet to Facebook’ because it is alleged that the company has repeatedly breached historic assurances about the security of its data. But the institutionalised chaos in Washington and the political clout of Silicon Valley make it hard to be optimistic about swift action.

In my gloomier moods, I am tempted to suggest that privacy has become a dead letter, a casualty of the stupendous interconnected universe. Even if Cambridge Analytica, or Facebook, are damaged as much as they deserve to be by this scandal, there are countless other online data markets where they came from.

If any of us wishes to conceal anything about ourselves, this can be achieved only by making sure that information does not appear on a computer.

Yet every detail of our finances, health record, employment history is stored somewhere out there, and can never be totally secure. Beyond rogue hackers, Russia and China are almost daily penetrating some of the most secret institutions in the West.

The latest Facebook scandal should nonetheless force every citizen, and especially our children, to understand the craziness of telling all online. We cannot simply surrender our bodies and souls to the net: however hard it may be, we must fight back against the recklessly irresponsible juggernauts that the social media companies have become.

Mark Zuckerberg, the evidence shows, is the least appropriate of Facebook friends.