The New York Times late Tuesday reported that some 150 companies -- including powerful partners like Amazon, Microsoft, Netflix and Spotify -- could access detailed information about Facebook users, including data about their friends. According to documents seen by the Times, Facebook allowed Microsoft's Bing search engine to see names of Facebook users' friends without consent and gave Netflix and Spotify the ability to read private messages." "Still, we recognise that we've needed tighter management over how partners and developers can access information," he added. LIMITSSpotify offered a similar response, indicating the music service "cannot read users' private Facebook inbox messages across any of our current integrations." Senator Brian Schatz said the latest revelations highlight a need for tougher controls on how tech companies handle user data.

Source: Daily Nation December 19, 2018 18:45 UTC