Facebook said Tuesday a new tool allowing users of the social network to view and delete data it collects from third parties is rolling out to the estimated two billion members of the leading social network worldwide.
The new feature, part of a stepped-up effort to improve privacy practices, allows users to see and clear "off Facebook activity" used for targeted advertising.
Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg said the tool offers "a new level of transparency and control" for the social network, which has been roiled by revelations in the past few years on how it collects and uses data.
"We've been working on this for a while because we had to rebuild some of our systems to make this possible."
Zuckerberg said Facebook users would be prompted to review their data when they check their feeds, as part of a "privacy checkup" implemented by the social network.
"As of today, our Off-Facebook Activity tool is available to people on Facebook around the world," Zuckerberg said in a blog post.
- Lifting the veil -
The feature will lift a veil on some aspects of Facebook's practices, including the collection of data from third-party apps, Facebook logins, "likes" and other techniques that determine which ads are served up to users.
"Other businesses send us information about your activity on their sites and we use that information to show you ads that are relevant to you. Now you can see a summary of that information and clear it from your account if you want to," Zuckerberg said.
Facebook gets data from users' activity online and also from apps such as Airbnb, Uber and Fandango.
The new tool is part of a ..
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