WorldFacebook on Wednesday launched a fresh effort to quell the firestorm over the hijacking of personal data, once again unveiling new privacy tools and settings to give users more control over how their information is shared. "We've heard loud and clear that privacy settings and other important tools are too hard to find," chief privacy officer Erin Egan and deputy general counsel Ashlie Beringer said in a blog post. The updates include easier access to Facebook's user settings and tools to easily search for, download and delete personal data stored on the site used by two billion people. "While this is common industry practice, we believe this step, winding down over the next six months, will help improve people's privacy on Facebook." Earlier this month, whistleblower Christopher Wylie revealed political consulting company Cambridge Analytica had obtained profiles on 50 million Facebook users via an academic researcher's personality prediction app.

Source: Sunday Times March 29, 2018 01:41 UTC