McKinsey ‘horrified’ its report on Saudi Arabia’s policies used
The document was a brief overview of social-media usage and meant for internal use, says the firm
New York — McKinsey & Co says it is “horrified” that a report it prepared to measure public perception of Saudi Arabia’s policies may have been used by the kingdom to silence dissidents. The consulting firm responded on Twitter to a New York Times article that detailed a report in which it identified several people driving conversations on Twitter. Those people were later arrested or had their social-media accounts shut down. In a nine-page report, the consulting firm found that responses to the country’s economic policies received twice as much coverage on Twitter than in the country’s traditional news media, and that negative sentiment was more common than positive statements on social media. The New York-based firm said it was not working in tandem with the Saudi government, and when it works with governments, the company “has not and never would engage in any work that seeks to target individuals based on their views,” according to a statement released on Saturday night. The doc...
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