In an unfortunate move for users, Facebook will go ahead with its plans to let third-party developers access its members’ information to include phone numbers and users’ home mailing addresses, according to a note sent from the company to Congress.
The letter was written to Reps. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) and Joe Barton (R-Texas) and it said Facebook will allow users to control which third-party sites would get to access their personal information.
Facebook had originally debuted this feature in January, but then stopped because it was worried that users would get bombarded with spam, be subject to identity theft and other problems.
Facebook said in a blog post that it had gotten some useful feedback that made it possible for users to be better able to tell when they were granting the access. They said changes were made to make sure users only shared info they wished to share.
When users play things like Farmville and Bejeweled Blitz, a pop up will appear that shows a note from the third-party developer asking if they can access users’ info. Facebook said that if they didn’t want to share the data, they can decline the third party from accessing it.
Facebook also put out updates on Mar. 1 to the comments box plugin, which will now make it easier for developers to customize comments boxes on their sites so they can get in sync with Facebook.
