Trinidad and Tobago Government to Review Cambridge Analytica's Role in Elections, Spying on Citizens Internet Activity

Trinidad and Tobago's Attorney General Faris Al-Rawi has said the government would start an audit of all state and government agencies to ascertain whether Cambridge Analytica or any of its partners broke the laws of the country. Addressing Parliament members Wednesday, he said allegations brought to light by Christopher Wylie; former Cambridge Analytica research director turned whistleblower, must be examined.

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“I shall ensure that this audit includes the application of a keen eye for any masked transactions through nominated/trustee entities to hide the true identity and nature of any services provided,” Al-Rawi said. He went on to emphasize that all government ministries, statutory authorities, state enterprises and the National Security Council will all be subject to the audit, according to Loop News.

Wylie alleges that AggregateIQ (AIQ), a company established alongside Cambridge Analytica, monitored the internet browsing of the citizens of Trinidad and Tobago after entering into a contractual arrangement with the country's previous government.

Wylie, speaking in the United Kingdom's Parliament Tuesday, said: “One of the things I’ve also passed on to the Committee is some of the contractual documentation and emails from some of AIQ’s past projects. One of them was for, at the time the Minister of National Security of Trinidad, in the contractual documents and also email chain, part of the project was to go out and try to find a way of accessing raw internet service provider data for the entire country to monitor what people were browsing.”

He noted: “As I understand that is not legal in Trinidad, it certainly won’t be illegal here.”

Wylie also said his former tech research firm, with links to Facebook, shared millions of people's data and collaborated with pro-Brexit campaigns such as Vote Leave, BeLeave, the DUP and Veterans for Britain. He characterized the collaboration as “cheating.” The “conversion rates” witnessed by the online, pro-Brexit advertising campaigns were “incredibly effective.” He contended that had it not been for “cheating” the Brexit result would have been different.