Facebook blocks developers from using its data for spying

San Francisco

FACEBOOK Inc barred software developers on Monday from using the massive social network's data to create surveillance tools, closing off a process that had been exploited by US police departments to track protesters. Facebook, its Instagram unit and rival Twitter Inc came under fire last year from privacy advocates after the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) said in a report that police were using location data and other user information to spy on protesters in places such as Ferguson, Missouri.

In response to the ACLU report, the companies shut off data access of Geofeedia, a Chicago-based data vendor that said it works with organisations to "leverage social media", but Facebook policy had not explicitly barred such use of data in the future. "Our goal is to make our policy explicit," Rob Sherman, Facebook's deputy chief privacy officer, said in a post on the social network on Monday. He was not immediately available for an interview.