14 DAY TRIAL // After a year-long investigation from the Canadian authorities, Facebook has announced that it will implement significant changes to the privacy policies, giving users more control over their data and, more importantly, radically changing the way third-party apps can access user data. The investigation focused on a number of allegations but found only a few to be unresolved including third-party apps, account deletion and accounts of deceased users.
The Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic (CIPPIC) believes that Facebook has taken very little steps in preventing applications from accessing user data that they may not require and doesn't provide the users with enough options to agree to what data can be accessed. Other issues were with the fact that Facebook didn't make the distinction between account deactivation and account deletion clear enough and with what happens to the accounts of deceased users.
In response to the conclusions of the investigation Facebook has announced it will take some drastic steps to comply with the findings. The company, of course, tries to make it look like it made the changes voluntarily and that it was already working on some of them but the fact remains that they came after the report was finished and in direct response to it.
“Our productive and constructive dialogue with the Commissioner’s office has given us an opportunity to improve our policies and practices in a way that will provide even greater transparency and control for Facebook users,” said Elliot Schrage, vice-president of Global Communications and Public Policy at Facebook. “We believe that these changes are not only great for our users and address all of the Commissioners' outstanding concerns, but they also set a new standard for the industry.”
The smaller concerns, deactivated and deleted accounts and the memorialization of the accounts of deceased users, should be easy to fix and Facebook has pledged it will make the necessary changes as well as updating the Privacy Policy to make it clearer in several aspects concerning privacy.
However, the biggest change will be the stricter rules that will be implemented for third-party apps. A new system will be introduced and all apps will have to explicitly get the permission from the users for accessing any of the profile information. This will affect the vast majority of the applications on Facebook and would require significant changes both to the platform and to the applications themselves. As such, Facebook believes the entire process will take up to a year to complete.