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North Carolina Joins Request For Answers On Facebook Privacy Practices

North Carolina Attorney General Josh Stein speaks to a crowd of supporters during a victory celebration for then Gov.-elect Roy Cooper in 2016. (AP Photo/Ben McKeown)

North Carolina's attorney general has joined dozens of others in asking for information on Facebook's business practices.

The news comes on the heels of increased public scrutiny of the social network.

Why all the scrutiny? Well, Facebook may have given over information from millions of user profiles to third-party developers without the users' knowledge.

What's more, Attorney General Josh Stein says Facebook may not have been authorized to obtain some of that personal data.

Stein is part of a group that includes 37 state and territorial attorneys general that sent a letter to Facebook demanding answers.

The letter raises a number of questions about the platform's terms of service, its safeguards when it comes to monitoring personal information and when the company learned about the Cambridge Analytica breach.

While there's no timeline for the company to respond, the letter asks for a prompt reply that accounts for how Facebook will allow users to protect their data in the future.

Sean Bueter joined WFDD in August 2015 as a reporter covering issues across the Piedmont Triad and beyond.Previously, Sean was a reporter, host and news director at WBOI in Fort Wayne, Ind., just a few hours from where he grew up. He also sorted Steve Inskeep's mail as an intern at NPR in Washington, D.C.Sean has experience on a variety of beats, including race, wealth and poverty, economic development, and more. His work has appeared on NPR's Morning Edition and All Things Considered, and APM's Marketplace.In his spare time, Sean plays tennis (reasonably well), golf (reasonably poorly), and scours local haunts for pinball machines to conquer.

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