Politicians from around the world today said they are 'deeply disappointed' at Mark Zuckerberg and posted a picture of his empty chair on the internet when he refused to appear before them at the UK Houses of Parliament.

The Facebook boss was 'empty chaired' when he snubbed a special meeting of politicians from nine different countries who want to grill him on the Cambridge Analytica scandal, privacy breaches and the spread of disinformation.

Mr Zuckerberg refused to appear before the committee despite being invited six months ago, and sent British Facebook executive and peer Richard Allan in his place.

And during the hearing of the 'grand committee' at the Commons, British politician Damian Collins revealed a Facebook engineer in 2014 warned bosses that Russians were harvesting three billion bits of data a day.

The revelation, which was contained in an internal Facebook email within a cache of secret documents seized by the committee last week and still under seal in the US, raises fresh questions about the firm's privacy breaches.

After exposing the previously unreported data harvesting operation, Mr Collins asked if Facebook had taken any action.

He said: 'An engineer at Facebook notified the company in 2014 that an entity with Russian IP addresses had been using an API key to pull over three billion data points a day...was that reported to any external body at the time?'

The politicians from nine different countries today posted this photograph of Mark Zuckerberg's empty chair (pictured) on Twitter after being left furious at the Facebook boss' refusal to give evidence to them in the UK Parliament today

The Facebook boss sent Richard Allan, a Lib Dem peer and senior Facebook executive, in his place to face the furious politicians (pictured)

There had been speculation that Mr Collins would release more form the seized documents including external Facebook communications - but that was the only portion he revealed.

But Mr Allan dismissed the allegations of a huge Russian data gathering operation as 'misleading' after they were obtained by lawyers acting for Tom Kramer, a developer suing Facebook, and handed to the committee after being dramatically seized from Mr Kramer by UK authorities. Facebook also said after the hearing that the claims were investigated and no evidence of Russian activity was found.

Lord Allan also admitted to the committee looked 'not good' to the outside world that the Facebook CEO snubbed the request.

The move sparked fury among politicians from countries including Argentina, Brazil, Canada, France, Latvia and Singapore, who had travelled to the UK for the grilling.

Charlie Angus, a politician from Canada, said 'we are deeply disappointed' at MR Zuckerberg's no show and demanded to know why he decided to 'blow off this meeting'.

Where do the Six4Three Facebook papers come from? The documents seized by Collins and his committee stem from a court case being heard in California between app developer Six4Three and Facebook. Ted Kramer, who owns the developer, launched a suit against Facebook after the tech company restricted to data that one of his apps - Pinkini - could access. The app was designed to identify bikini photos among albums posted by friends on Facebook, and the restrictions effectively killed it. As part of the lawsuit, Kramer accuses Facebook of encouraging developers to build apps based around access to data that it then withdrew. He also alleges that Zuckerberg sold expensive ads to developers in return for long-term access to the data. This form of access was later exploited by Cambridge Analytica in an attempt to affect elections. As part of his case, Kramer got his hands on documents - said to include confidential emails between senior executives, and correspondence with Zuckerberg - apparently showing they knew about issues around the privacy of user data. Facebook fought for months to keep the documents secret, and was ultimately vindicated when a California judge ruled in its favor. But now Collins is threatening to publish the documents because he is outside of US jurisdiction and protected in his role as a minister heading up an investigation. Advertisement

He added: 'Mr Zuckerberg's decision to not appear here speaks volumes.

'When he says that the plan was, to move fast and break things, and that breaking may have involved our Democratic institutions, does he not think or not believe that parliamentarians will push back?'

His colleague Bob Zimmer said: 'In this room we represent over 400 million people, and to not have your CEO sit in that chair is an offence to all of us in this room, and our citizens as well.'

Lord Allan said Facebook would 'very much welcome' tighter regulations to clamp down on fake news and foreign interference in elections, saying new laws would be 'extraordinarily helpful'.

But Lord Allan, a Lib Dem peer in the UK, admitted Mr Zuckerberg's refusal to show up looks 'not good' to the outside world.

He added: 'I also have a role supporting my company as it tries to grapple with the issues it faces today.

'I am proud of the fact that we have answered thousands of questions and appeared in front of many committee hearings around the world.'

Lord Allan also admitted that trust in Facebook has plummeted in the wake of a series of scandals, saying: 'We recognise through our own actions and external events that we are not in a good place in terms of trust.'

Today's hearing comes after British MP Mr Collins used his parliamentary powers to seize a cache of secret documents linked to the Cambridge Analytica Facebook privacy scandal.

He sent a House of Commons Serjeant at Arms to personally demand documents from the founder of a company called Six4Three, a controversial app that allowed people to find pictures of friends in bikinis.

The papers - said to include confidential emails between senior executives, and correspondence with Mr Zuckerberg - are under orders to be kept secret by a US court.

What are the accusations against Facebook? Facebook is facing allegations from all over the work that it has been used to spread 'fake news', interfere with elections, and peddle hate. It is also facing hugely damaging revelations of privacy data breaches among its accounts. Here are some of the controversies it has been embroiled in: 'Fake news' and Russia Facebook has come under the spotlight amid claims that Russian accounts used the platform to spread 'fake news' during the 2016 Brexit referendum. In America, Russians accounts have been accused of using Facebook to harm Hilary Clinton's prospects of being elected over Donald Trump. In the UK, some have claimed that misleading information was used to promote Brexit in the run up to the 2016 referendum. Cambridge Analytica Scandal: The data of around 87 million Facebook users was harvested by the company Cambridge Analytica (CA). It has been claimed CA used the information to assess peoples' personalities and come up with political strategies to sway voters to back Brexit and Donald Trump. Spread of extremism and hate Facebook has been repeatedly criticised for not being quick enough to take extremist content down from its site. Critics have warned that Facebook has become a safe haven for extremists who peddle hate and try to recruit jihadis to kill and maim. Advertisement

The Tory MP said he would not be publishing the documents - but did reveal that they suggested Russia had been using the social networking site to get access to massive amounts of information.

He said: 'An engineer at Facebook notified the company in 2014 that an entity with Russian IP addresses had been using an API key to pull over three billion data points a day...was that reported to any external body at the time?'

But Lord Allan downplayed the claims - saying it was from a 'hostile litigant' adding: 'Any information is at best partial, or at worst misleading.'

He said he will look into the claim and write to the committee to explain what the firm's position is.

The hearing is the first time politicians from around the world have taken part in such an international hearing in the British Parliament since 1933.

They have travelled to hold a special session of the inquiry, which was set up to investigate fake news on Facebook after the 2016 EU referendum but widened following revelations about Cambridge Analytica and claims Russia used the social network to spread disinformation and sow chaos.

Lord Allan was challenged over whether Facebook poses a threat to democracy.

He said: 'What we want are free and fair elections.'

He said that Facebook did spot attempts to interfere in the US elections, but downplayed the impact it had on the outcome.

He said: 'In an election campaign there is a huge amount of legitimate activity carried out by all the parties… we did spot this activity that was wrong, shouldn't have happened, but we think that if you look at what changed the outcome, it's the main point.'

But Mr Zimmer accused him of 'downplaying' the role of Facebook and its impact on elections.

He said: 'You seem to deflect and deflect, and at the same time you are collecting billions of dollars.'

In a later part of the hearing, the UK Information Commissioner Elizabeth Denham (pictured at today's committee) told the politicians she would have fined Facebook more than £500,000 over the Cambridge Analytica scandal if she had the power to do so

Mr Angus slammed Facebook a scandal which saw the company overestimate how long users watched videos for, and he suggested Facebook should be broken up.

He said: 'I would consider that corporate fraud, on a massive scale...and the best fix is anti-trust.

Data watchdog says she is 'disappointed' in Facebook failures The Information Commissioner told MPs from eight countries today that she was 'disappointed' in Facebook's failure to follow data laws. In a second part of the unprecedented grand committee, Elizabeth Denham said Facebook was one of the most 'innovate companies in the world' but had failed to apply its talents to protecting users. Ms Denham, who fined Facebook £500,000 over the Cambridge Analytica scandal, said she would have imposed harsher punishment on the firm if she had powers to do so. She told the committee there needed to be a 'new set of standards' to deal with internet harms and insisted they could be regulated. But Ms Denham said Facebook's behaviour had proven it would not do so voluntarily. Advertisement

'The simplest form of regulation would be to break Facebook up, or treat it as a utility, so that we can all be sure that we're counting metrics that are accurate or true.

'To allow you to gobble up all the competition is not good.'

He added: 'I am not saying we are turning the internet off, I am saying that Facebook in its unwillingness to be accountable to the international body and legislators around the world, maybe anti trust would be something that would help us be able to get credible, democratic responses from a corporation.'

To make sure we get credible Alessandro Molon, from the Brazilian Parliament, said the internet poses one of the biggest threats to democracy.

He said: 'The internet doesn't respect borders, which poses a challenge to national legislation.'

Edwin Tong, a politician from Singapore, challenged Lord Allan about posts put up on Facebook in Sri Lanka fueling tensions within the Muslim community there.

But he said that despite the fact that it breached the company's hate speech rules, it was not taken down until Facebook was blocked in the country.

He said: 'This is a very egregious mistake - it goes completely against your own policy to take down immediately...Facebook cannot always be trusted to decide what can appear on its platform.'

Lord Allan said: 'As an employee of Facebook I am ashamed that these things happen, and they do and they shouldn't.'

Nele Lijnen, from the Belgium Parliament, also lashed Mr Zuckerberg for refusing to give evidence today.

Turning to Lord Allan, she said: 'Do you know what the expression send your cats in means? I am from the Flemish part of Belgium and in my language it means not showing up.

'So we can say colleagues that Mark Zuckerberg sent his cat to us today – to Canada, Singapore, France, Belgium, the United Kingdom, he sent his cat.'

The fiery grilling came days after Mr Collins deployed rarely-used parliamentary powers to seize documents linked to Facebook from the app developer Six4Three.

Facebook has demanded the Six4Three papers are handed back without being opened by MPs or published.

Six4Three are the makers of the controversial app Pinkini, and is suing Facebook for restricting the app's access to users' data.

As part of its case, Six4Three's lawyers were handed internal Facebook documents - including executives' email correspondence with Mr Zuckerberg - but they were 'sealed' by a court in California, meaning they are kept secret.

It believed the documents show how the firm created and effectively drew attention to a privacy loophole later used by Cambridge Analytica to collect the data of millions of users.

Six4Three managing director Ted Kramer gave the documents to British authorities after being warned he could be banned from leaving the UK if he refused.

In an extraordinary sequence of events, he ignored three demands for the emails before being personally served by a Serjeant at Arms and meeting Mr Collins in his Commons office.

Charlie Angus, a politician from Canada,(pictured) lashed Mr Zuckerberg for not bothering to show up to the committee, saying 'we are deeply disappointed'

MPs drew up the 'unprecedented' order to seize the documents after discovering that Mr Kramer was due to visit the UK.

Mr Kramer has claimed in court documents he 'panicked' while in the meeting with Mr Collins and his staff, meaning he copied documents from his cloud storage and onto a USB stick.

But after seizing the documents, Mr Collins said: 'Under UK law and parliamentary privilege we can publish papers if we choose to.

'As you know we have asked many questions of Facebook about its policies on sharing user data.

'I believe these documents may contain important information.'

In a statement issued after the committee hearing today, Facebook said of the claim that an engineer had flagged concerns about Russians trawling the site for data: ‘The engineers who had flagged these initial concerns subsequently looked into this further and found no evidence of specific Russian activity.'

Who is grilling Facebook at today's hearing? Politicians around the world are separately investigating Facebook and its role in fake news. Many have demanded evidence from Mark Zuckerberg personally - but have been rebuffed as he only agreed to speak to the US Senate and European Parliament. Britain's Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee chaired by Damian Collins MP set up an international hearing to try and persuade the Facebook founder to come. He refused again but committee will meet today anyway. It includes:

Leopoldo Moreau, Chair, Freedom of Expression Commission, Chamber of Deputies, Argentina

Nele Lijnen, member, Committee on Infrastructure, Communications and Public Enterprises, Parliament of Belgium

Alessandro Molon, Member of the Chamber of Deputies, Brazil

Bob Zimmer, Chair, and Nathaniel Erskine-Smith and Charlie Angus, Vice Chairs, Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics, House of Commons, Canada

Catherine Morin-Desailly, Chair, Standing Committee on Culture, Education and Media, French Senate

Hildegarde Naughton, Chair, and Eamon Ryan, Deputy Chair, Joint Committee on Communications, Climate Action and Environment, Parliament of Ireland

Dr Inese Lībiņa-Egnere, Deputy Speaker, Parliament of Latvia

Pritam Singh, Edwin Tong and Sun Xueling, members, Select Committee on Deliberate Online Falsehoods, Parliament of Singapore. Advertisement

Mr Collins is attempting to hold Facebook to account over data breaches that affected more than 87 million Facebook users in the Cambridge Analytica scandal.

An app called ThisIsYourDigitalLife harvested the data of millions of Facebook users, largely without their knowledge, then sold it on to now-defunct political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica.

The firm then used the data to target political advertising at users during both the US elections in 2016 and the Brexit referendum when it worked on behalf of Donald Trump's campaign and Leave.EU.

The documents were seized after Mr Zuckerberg was forced to defend his job over revelations that Facebook knew about Russian election interference despite denying it and used lobby firms to smear critics.

It was revealed last week that Facebook deliberately misled the public about what it knew about the Kremlin's 2016 election tampering.

The tech giant also employed a 'research firm' to smear protesters by linking them to George Soros and a lobby firm to brand critics anti-Semites.

When asked today if would consider stepping down as chairman Mr Zuckerberg told CNN Business 'That's not the plan.'

He was critical of the use of lobby and research firms to attack opponents.

'I wasn't particularly happy about that piece of it. And that's certainly a lot of what made me want to look into this more deeply,' he said.

'The intention was never to attack an individual but there are lobbying groups out there who are out to attack, it's fine to push back on them.'

He also criticised the decision to link critics to George Soros.

'George Soros has been the target of a lot of really horrendous attacks and I think that that is terrible and I certainly wouldn't want anyone who is associated with our company to be a part of that,' he said.

'A lot of the critique that folks have had about our company, I read and I think a lot of it is fair and we need to do better and learn from but at the same time I don't think all of it is fair.'

Facebook's share price has been tanking since it became embroiled in the data scandal, and took a particularly sharp nose-dive in recent weeks.

The social network is down almost 20 per cent in this quarter compared to last, with shares selling at $134.82 last week.

On July 25, Facebook was selling at $217.50 a share.

Lord Allan has also urged Mr Collins not to reveal the documents. He warned Collins yesterday in an email that the documents are 'sub judice before a court in California' and are 'sealed'.

Lord Allan is a Liberal Democrat peer and unlike previous Facebook witnesses at the House of Commons is an expert in Parliament's procedures.

He spent eight years as MP for Sheffield Hallam and was succeeded by Nick Clegg, who has since been hired by Facebook since he lost the seat last year.

A US judge in California had ordered the files, obtained from Facebook via a legal discovery process, could not be revealed to the public earlier this year.

Mr Zuckerberg has repeatedly refused to attend the UK Parliament saying that he has already testified to Congress in the US and before the European Union.

'It is not possible for Mr Zuckerberg to be available to all parliaments,' the firm said.

Facebook said after the documents were seized: 'The materials obtained by the DCMS committee are subject to a protective order of the San Mateo Superior Court restricting their disclosure.

'We have asked the DCMS committee to refrain from reviewing them and to return them to counsel or to Facebook.

'We have no further comment.'