Facebook has so far suspended “around 200” apps in the wake of the Cambridge Analytica scandal.
The social network has cracked down on apps with access to large quantities of user data as a part of an audit following the March leak that saw the data of nearly 90 million users fall into the hands of the President Trump-affiliated research firm.
The apps were suspended pending a thorough investigation into whether they misused any data, Ime Archibong, Facebook’s vice president of product partnerships, said in a blog post.
Facebook said it has looked into “thousands” of apps to date as part of an investigation that Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg announced on March 21.
Zuckerberg had said the social network will investigate all apps that had access to large amounts of information before the company curtailed data access in 2014.
“There is a lot more work to be done to find all the apps that may have misused people’s Facebook data — and it will take time,” Archibong said. “We have large teams of internal and external experts working hard to investigate these apps as quickly as possible.”
Facebook will conduct interviews and request information from apps that it has concerns with, and may go as far as to perform audits that include on-site inspections, Archibong said.
If Facebook’s investigations find that apps misused private information, the apps will be banned and users will be informed.
“It will show people if they or their friends installed an app that misused data before 2015,” Archibong said.
Facebook was hit by the privacy scandal in mid-March after media reports that Cambridge Analytica improperly accessed data to build profiles on American voters and influence the 2016 presidential election.
The incident led to backlash from celebrities and resulted in the company losing billions in market value. Zuckerberg apologized for the mistakes his company made and testified before the Capitol Hill lawmakers.
The company, however, regained much of its lost market value after it reported a surprisingly strong 63 percent rise in profit and an increase in users when it announced quarterly results on April 25.


