Facebook hires former Bush regulator

Facebook has hired a former senior Bush administration regulator in Washington to defend its privacy practices as it confronts increasing scrutiny on Capitol Hill and the federal regulatory agency charged with consumer protection. Tim Muris, the former Republican chairman of the Federal Trade Commission who now serves as an attorney at the law firm O'Melveny & Myers, was enlisted at a time when the FTC is taking a close look at complaints against the social networking Internet company that have been filed by privacy advocates, according to people familiar with the matter. As Facebook grows more influential in the lives of its 400m users, governments around the globe are grappling with questions of whether - and how - to regulate the Internet phenomenon. And Facebook is responding.