Americans less likely to trust Facebook than rivals on personal data: Reuters/Ipsos poll

Fewer than half of Americans trust Facebook to obey U.S. privacy laws, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll released on Sunday, illustrating the challenge facing the social media network after a scandal over its handling of personal information.

The poll, taken Wednesday through Friday, also found that fewer Americans trust Facebook than other tech companies that gather user data, such as Apple Inc, Alphabet Inc’s Google, Amazon.com Inc, Microsoft Corp and Yahoo.

Some 41 percent of Americans trust Facebook to obey laws that protect their personal information, compared with 66 percent who said they trust Amazon, 62 percent who trust Google, 60 percent for Microsoft and 47 percent for Yahoo.

The Reuters/Ipsos poll was conducted online in English throughout the United States. It gathered responses from 2,237 people and has a credibility interval, a measure of accuracy, of 2 percentage points. 

Facebook, the world's largest social media firm, has been offering apologies as it tries to repair its reputation among users, advertisers, lawmakers and investors for mistakes that let 50 million users' data get into the hands of political consultancy Cambridge Analytica. (Graphic: Poll data - tmsnrt.rs/2pFHBfN)

Facebook shares tumbled 14 percent last week, while the hashtag #DeleteFacebook gained traction online and the company’s chief executive officer, Mark Zuckerberg, faced demands that he appear before U.S. lawmakers to testify in a hearing.