Facebook has agreed to change its terms and conditions to make it more clear to users of the social network how it uses their personal data to develop profiling and advertising, the EU announced. The European Commission and EU consumer protection authorities had called on Facebook to improve the information in the wake of the Cambridge Analytica scandal last year and also bring all its terms into line with EU consumer law. Failure to act could have resulted in fines for the company. Facebook agreed to make the changes by June this year, according Telecompaper. The new terms detail the services Facebook sells to third parties that are based on user data, how consumers can close their accounts and under what reasons accounts can be disabled. These developments come after talks with the company aimed at obtaining full disclosure of Facebook's business model in a comprehensive and plain language for users, said EU justice commissioner Vera Jourova.
The company is expected to introduce new text in its terms and services explaining that it does not charge users for its services in return for users' agreement to share their data and to be exposed to commercial advertisements. Facebook's terms will clearly explain that the business model relies on selling targeted advertising services by using the data from the profiles of its users.
In addition, following the EU enforcement action, Facebook has amended its policy on limitation of liability and now acknowledges its responsibility in case of negligence, for instance in case data has been mishandled by third parties like in the Cambridge Analytica case. The company also agreed that any unilateral changes in its terms and conditions will be limited to cases where the changes are reasonable and also taking into account the interest of the consumer.
Furthermore, any content deleted by users can be retained by the company only in specific cases – for instance to comply with a law enforcement request – and for a maximum of 90 days in case of technical reasons. In addition, the company improved its language on the right of users to appeal if their content is removed from the platform.
