The Singapore Democratic Party (SDP) published a statement on March 29 seeking a meeting with social media giant Facebook.

This was on the back of the brewing scandal where British consulting firm Cambridge Analytica, through a third-party researcher, was able to collect data from 50 million Facebook users and subsequently use that data to allegedly aid Donald Trump during the 2016 US Elections.

SDP's questions

In SDP's statement, signed off by SDP Chairman Paul Tambyah, a total of six questions were presented.

Here they are in full:

1. Whether the Singapore government has requested for information on users and, if so, when and on what grounds.
2. Whether any political party in Singapore have requested for information on users and, if so, when and on what grounds.
3. Whether any group or individual either formally or informally affiliated to any political party in Singapore received data from Cambridge Analytica or any other similar organisation that might have used information taken from Facebook especially during the periods of the 2015 general election or the 2016 Bukit Batok by-election.
4. Whether Facebook can make public the list of advertisements made by the Singapore government on Facebook and the amounts paid for these advertisements especially during the periods of the 2015 general election or the 2016 Bukit Batok by-election.
5. Whether Facebook can make public the list of political parties and other political actors who have advertised on Facebook including the amounts paid for these advertisements especially during the periods of the 2015 general election or the 2016 Bukit Batok by-election.
6. Whether any of the senior positions in Facebook's Singapore office are occupied by persons who are actively involved with, or identified as potential election candidates of, any political party in Singapore.

Bukit Batok by-election 2016

During the Bukit Batok by-election in 2016, SDP secretary-general Chee Soon Juan ran against the People's Action Party's Murali Pillai.

PAP won 61.2 percent to SDP's 38.8 percent. The by-election was triggered when incumbent PAP MP David Ong resigned after allegedly committing an extramarital affair.

When probed on his defeat, Chee told The Straits Times that the media had not been fair to him.

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Facebook publishes government requests

Facebook currently publishes government requests to the company.

The website published the number of requests made by the Singapore Government from January 2013 to June 2017.

In total, 3,385 requests were made in the four-year period.

However, not every request was entertained. Facebook states that "every request we receive is checked for legal sufficiency and we reject or require greater specificity on requests that are overly broad or vague."

Between January 2017 to June 2017 alone, an average 59 percent of requests saw some data produced by Facebook.