Facebook Inc (FB) Won’t Let Firms Build Surveillance Tools Using Its Data

Facebook

Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) on Monday said it will not allow companies to use its data to make tracking software.

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The social networking giant is updating its policies to make it clear to developers that they cannot use Facebook or Instagram to make tracking software, according to a report from Fortune.

“Over the past several months we have taken enforcement action against developers who created and marketed tools meant for surveillance, in violation of our existing policies; we want to be sure everyone understands the underlying policy and how to comply,” Rob Sherman, Facebook’s deputy chief privacy officer, wrote in the blog post.

Facebook acknowledged the American Civil Liberties Union of California and other advocacy groups for helping it to develop the new surveillance policies.

There were reports about companies that sell social media-based surveillance systems to police departments and foreign governments.

“Such tools might, for example, use facial recognition tools to scan a crowd of people and identify the faces against a database of Facebook users. Or they might draw on location data obtained from Twitter to monitor the movements of a given user,” reads Fortune.

Facebook and other social media companies including Twitter have already taken hard steps to stop certain companies – such as Chicago-based Geofeedia – from using their data.

However, the report suggests that the new Facebook’s policy is unlikely to be 100% effective.

Facebook and other companies provide developers APIs (application program interfaces) to build services on top of its platform. Allowing this benefits both users and companies. Still, it is not clear how Facebook will monitor how developers use its data.

In related news, President Trump’s senior counselor Kellyanne Conway recently told the Bergen County Record that hackers can even turn microwave ovens into cameras for surveillance.

Responding Kelly’s question about whether Trump’s campaign headquarters could have been spied by the Obama administration, Conway said: “What I can say is there are many ways to surveil each other now, unfortunately.”

“There was an article this week that talked about how you can surveil someone through their phones — certainly through their television sets, any number of different ways. And microwaves that turn into cameras, et cetera,” she added.

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