Instagram has routinely copied the features of its rival Snapchat, and Snap Inc. CEO Evan Spiegel wishes the Facebook-owned app would copy one more thing as well — how Snap handles user data.
“We’d appreciate it if they copied our data protection practices also,” Spiegel said at Code Conference in Rancho Palos Verdes, California, on Tuesday night.
The zinger drew a roar and applause from the crowd. Facebook, of course, is still recovering from the Cambridge Analytica data leak scandal, where up to 87 million users had their information unwittingly compromised.
Spiegel’s zing came while answering a question from Recode co-founder Kara Swisher on the challenges of having the competition essentially steal Snapchat’s most famous features, most notably Stories. But, Spiegel insisted, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.
Instagram copying Snapchat is the “most fantastic thing in the world,” Spiegel told Swisher.