INTERNATIONAL – Russian billionaire tech investor Yuri Milner downplayed the problems suffered this year by Facebook Inc.
"I don’t agree that it’s an existential crisis, I think it’s a little bump in the road," Milner said during an interview with Bloomberg TV. Facebook is an evolving system continuously responding to challenges and there will "always be bad actors who are testing different products," he added.
Yuri Milner discusses the private space race, election meddling and Europe’s potential in the tech industry.
Milner, is general partner of DST Global, an early backer of Facebook and Twitter Inc. Both social-media companies have been grappling with bots and other fake accounts spreading misinformation.
Facebook has been mired in scandals, including a cyber attack that exposed the intimate data of 14 million users. Russia also used Facebook to meddle in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
Milner’s more recent investments focus on space exploration. While Jeff Bezos and Sir Richard Branson have space tourism projects, Milner has backed Breakthrough Starshot, a $100 million project to find other forms of life in the universe.
"The universe is much bigger than just our solar system," he told Bloomberg TV during the Breakthrough Prize Awards in Mountain View, California. Within the next seven years, Milner hopes to determine whether it is "feasible and realistic" to move between the stars and hunt for alien life.