4 moments that marked the history of the largest social network, which aspired to exceed 500 users

This Monday, February 4th marks the 15th anniversary of the young Mark Zuckerberg who created on Facebook at Harvard University (USA), a new way of connecting people via the network that has become the largest social network in the world. reaching 2,320 million monthly active users worldwide, even if initially it only counted to exceed 500 people.

Since its creation in 2004, Facebook has experienced several moments that have marked what it is today as a social network and as a company, first steps in which it was not yet open to the public until to the scandal of the protection of the private life such as that of. Cambridge Analytica, via the purchase of other services on the rise such as WhatsApp and Instagram.

FIRST STEPS: THEFACEBOOK AND THE WALL

In an interview with US broadcaster CNBC in 2004, Zuckerberg described his platform, then known as thefacebook.com, as "an online directory that connects people through universities." Facebook was born at Harvard University and was gradually extended to other universities in the United States, reaching 800 centers and also institutes.

At the time, Thefacebook had only 1,200 users and Zuckerberg was surprised at what he initially hoped would be 400 or 500 people, according to the interview. In the first moments, to create an account, it was necessary to be invited by another user, and this was limited to the academic field.

One of the first milestones of the original story of Thefacebook was the introduction of the wall, just seven months after its creation, in September 2004. With this feature, it was now possible to leave public messages in the profiles of other users.

OPENING AND GROWTH IN THE WORLD

On September 26, 2006, Facebook (which had already adopted its current name since 2005) was opened as a portal for users around the world. In this way, any user (person or company) can open his own account for the first time without the need for an invitation.

In the following years, Facebook is growing and consolidating as a platform, with milestones such as the introduction of the "I Like" button in 2008. To this we add new features. others, such as the launch of the Facebook mobile application (October 2007) or the arrival of videos (June 2007).

The expansion of Facebook is complemented by the arrival of Facebook in other countries and in other languages. Spanish was the first language incorporated into the original English language in February 2008 and came from 1,500 volunteers. Shortly after, French and German followed and today, Facebook is available in 140 languages.

PURCHASE OF WHATSAPP AND INSTAGRAM

Facebook's growth as a social network has also led to the expansion of the company, which began to buy other applications at the time booming. The first was the social network of Instagram images, extended to young audiences, in April 2012.

https://www.elmundo.es/elmundo/2012/04/09/navegante/1333991473.html Just two years after its creation, Facebook has paid 1,000 million dollars for Instagram and has kept it as independent service, what remains So, at present, Zuckerberg plans to integrate the company's messaging services (Messenger, WhatsApp, Instagram).

The WhatsApp messaging app was just another of Facebook's big moves at this point, with its purchase in 2014 for $ 22,000 million. With 600 million users at the time, WhatsApp was the most used messaging service and remains the current favorite. It has been chosen by users from 131 countries around the world, including Spain, according to Hootsuite data.

SCANDALS: CAMBRIDGE ANALYTICA AND RESEARCH

With the expansion of Facebook, some of his biggest scandals have also arrived. In March 2018, the case of Cambridge Analytica, a consulting firm that had illegally obtained data from 50 million users and used them for the benefit of political campaigns such as Donald Trump in the US presidential election of 2016, had been unearthed.

This data, obtained through an application that voluntarily installed only 270,000 people, was also used in the Brexit campaign in the UK. The use of Facebook as an interfering tool of foreign countries, such as Russia in the US elections, forced the appearance before the Congress of that country of the head of operations of the company, Sheryl Sandberg, who acknowledged that Facebook had been "very slow to detect" foreign propaganda.

Currently, Facebook has been splashed by other controversies, including that of its market research program on Facebook Research. With this software, it took between 13 and 35 years to pay a user to install a virtual private network (VPN) allowing the company to access all data on your device.

After learning about the existence of Facebook Research and finding that the company had paid teen users for their personal data, she was forced to close this program at the end of January, but not before to have vetoed Apple.

Despite the criticisms received, Facebook, 15 years after its creation, continues to grow in number of users. According to the latest data, its total figure reached 2,320 million monthly active users, representing an increase of 9% over the previous year. One in four people in the world already use the Zuckerberg repository created in 2004, which already asked "who knows what will happen next".