Chinese (Simplified) 
Chinese (Traditional) 
English 
French 
Alemão 
Italian 
Japanese 
Norwegian 
Spanish 
7 min read
0 comments
From a college project to a digital empire, Mark Zuckerberg created Facebook, fought his way through battles, made billions and now leads Meta into the age of artificial intelligence
Mark Zuckerberg transformed a university idea into one of the largest technological empires in the world. Founder of Facebook e CEO of Meta, he is behind platforms like WhatsApp, Instagram, Threads and advances in the metaverse.
His journey began with simple lines of code while he was still a teenager and has evolved into billion-dollar decisions that shape the way billions of people communicate, consume information and interact online.
Mark Zuckerberg accumulates achievements, controversies and, according to Bloomberg, has a fortune of more than US $ 211 billion (the amount of wealth varies depending on the source).
-
Why sockets changed in Brazil — and what really motivated the current three-pin standard
-
What's the difference between regular, premium and premium gasoline — and which one is really worth it?
-
Warning about faucets sold on Amazon with high lead risk
-
From Aleppo to Wall Street: How Safra Bank Built the World's Largest Banking Empire, Worth Over $100 Billion
Buy
It only took Mark Zuckerberg about four years to become a billionaire. In 2008, at the age of 23, he entered the Forbes list with an estimated fortune of US$ 1,5 billion.
His story mixes precocious genius, legal disputes, futuristic ambitions and global influence.
From the dormitory in Harvard At the center of the debate over privacy, misinformation and artificial intelligence, he remains one of the most powerful — and controversial — figures of the digital age.
At age 12, he created a messaging system for his father's office. At 19, he launched a social network in a college dorm. At 23, he became a billionaire. Today, at 40 years old, Mark Zuckerberg is at the head of one of the biggest technology companies on the planet.
Responsible for Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, Threads, Reality Labs and Meta Quest, he runs the Meta, a group that has more than 3 billion users connected daily. This is the full story of the creator of the most famous social network in the world.
Mark Zuckerberg's Childhood
Mark Elliot Zuckerberg was born on May 14, 1984, in White Plains, New York.
He grew up in the village of Dobbs Ferry with three sisters — Randi, Donna and Arielle — in a well-off family with an educational and financial background.
His father, Edward, was a dentist and ran a home practice. His mother, Karen, was a psychiatrist, but left the profession to dedicate herself to her family.
From an early age, Zuckerberg demonstrated a talent for computers. At the age of 12, he created the “Zucknet“, a messaging system using Atari BASIC, which allowed the office receptionist to notify when a patient arrived.
The system was also used by the family at home.
Over time, he began developing games with friends who designed the characters.
His interest was so great that his parents hired a teacher, David Newman, for private computer lessons. Even so, the teacher found it difficult to keep up with him.
Advanced education before university
Zuckerberg attended the Ardsley High School and took extra computer classes at Mercy College.
He then attended the exclusive Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire, where he was captain of the fencing team, but remained focused on computers.
As his final project, he created Synapse, a music software similar to Pandora. Big companies, such as AOL and Microsoft, tried to buy the project and hire the young man, but he turned down all offers.
In 2002, he was accepted into Harvard. He gained fame on campus for his programming skills.
He created CourseMatch, which helped students choose courses based on the choices of others.
He then launched Facemash, which compared photos of students to decide who was more attractive. It was a success, but was removed by the university for being considered inappropriate.
The creation of Facebook
Based on the fame he had gained for his projects, three colleagues — Divya Narendra and twins Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss — invited Zuckerberg to program a social network called HarvardConnection.
He initially accepted, but later abandoned the project and began working on his own platform.
In February 2004, Zuckerberg launched TheFacebook with friends Dustin Moskovitz, Chris Hughes and Eduardo Saverin.
The project was run out of a Harvard dormitory. Within a few months, it had 1 million users.
In June, Zuckerberg left the university and moved the company to Palo Alto, California.
Growth and investments
In 2005, the company dropped the “The” from its name and became known simply as Facebook.
Received an investment of US$ 12,7 million from Accel Partners and began opening the platform to more universities, schools and international users. By the end of 2005, it had 5,5 million users.
Companies like Yahoo! and MTV Networks have expressed interest in buying Facebook, but Zuckerberg has declined. He preferred to maintain control and expand the platform's capabilities.
The controversy with the founders of ConnectU
Shortly after the launch of Facebook, the founders of Harvardconnection sued Zuckerberg, accusing him of stealing the idea and source code.
He denied it, but emails and messages revealed that he accessed journalists' accounts to try to prevent the accusation from being made public.
In September 2004, the Winklevoss twins and Narendra filed a lawsuit.
The dispute was settled in 2008 with a $65 million settlement, but it didn't end until 2011. Leaked messages showed that Zuckerberg considered sharing user data with friends. He later apologized and said he had matured.
Movie “The Social Network”
In 2010, the story of the creation of Facebook hit theaters with the film “The social network”, based on the book “Accidental Billionaires”, by Ben Mezrich. The film was a success, but was criticized by Zuckerberg.
According to him, the narrative was fanciful, especially the part that suggested he created Facebook to impress girls.
At the time, he was already dating his current wife, Priscilla Chan. The billionaire said the costumes were correct, but the script distorted the facts.
Despite this, 2010 was a year of recognition. He was named “Person of the Year” by Time magazine and topped Vanity Fair’s business list.
IPO and new acquisitions
In May 2012, Facebook went public. The initial public offering (IPO) raised $16 billion, valuing the company at $104 billion — one of the largest IPOs on the Internet. In the following days, the stock fluctuated, but Zuckerberg resisted the pressure.
In 2013, Facebook entered the Fortune 500 list. At 28, Zuckerberg became the youngest CEO on the list.
In the same year, Facebook bought Instagram for $1 billion.
The startup had only 13 employees. The bet proved to be right. Instagram surpassed 2 billion users.
In 2014, the company purchased WhatsApp for $19 billion. In 2019, Zuckerberg began technical integration between WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook Messenger.
This decision led to the departure of WhatsApp's founders, but helped to further popularize the application, which today has almost 3 billion users.
Mark Zuckerberg has already hadand scandals, politics and the Libra case
In 2019, Facebook announced its entry into the cryptocurrency market with Libra.
The proposal was to create a global digital currency. To this end, it formed the Libra Association with partners such as Spotify and Andreessen Horowitz.
Zuckerberg has been summoned to testify before the US Congress.
The project faced strong resistance from regulators, especially after scandals such as Cambridge Analytica. In 2022, the project was shut down and renamed Diem.
Criticism for misinformation and hate speech
During the 2020 election, Facebook promised to combat misinformation with independent fact-checkers. Yet it has come under fire for allowing fake news about politics and COVID-19.
In May of that year, Zuckerberg refused to remove Donald Trump's posts with false information about voting and attacks on protesters.
This sparked a virtual strike among employees. The CEO defended his stance as a commitment to freedom of expression.
Facebook later suspended political ads for a week before the election. After the attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021, Trump's account was banned indefinitely. The suspension was reversed two years later.
Zuckerberg testified again before Congress, denying that the platform had encouraged the riot, but acknowledged the need for action against misinformation.
Rebranding and the birth of Meta
In 2021, the company underwent a major change.
In October, Zuckerberg announced that Facebook would be renamed Meta. The change was part of an attempt to distance itself from controversy and focus on a new digital future.
Meta began investing heavily in virtual reality. It launched the metaverse, with platforms such as Roblox, Fortnite and The Sandbox. He also developed the Ray-Ban Stories glasses and invested in AI with open source models.
In January 2025, Zuckerberg announced the biggest investment in the company's history: $60 billion in artificial intelligence. The plan includes the construction of a 375-square-meter data center in Louisiana.
Fortune and heritage
As of May 09, 2025, Mark Zuckerberg was worth $211 billion, according to Bloomberg.
He has been a billionaire since 2008, when he was just 23 years old. After the 2012 IPO, his fortune grew even more. Today, he owns 13% of Meta's shares and is one of the largest shareholders in OpenAI.
Zuckerberg also owns a $270 million compound in Hawaii called Koolau Ranch, which spans 1.400 acres and includes a 5.000-square-foot underground bunker.
Even with so many challenges, accusations, changes and technological transformations, Zuckerberg continues to lead one of the most influential companies in the world. Now, with a focus on artificial intelligence and the metaverse, he continues to shape the future of global technology.
If you want to read the full story of Elon Musk click here this link.
