The company changed its policies for Facebook and Instagram to explicitly state that developers cannot “use data obtained from us to provide tools that are used for surveillance”, Rob Sherman, Facebook’s deputy chief privacy officer wrote on Facebook.

According to Facebook, the use of its data for surveillance was against its policies already before, but after a coalition of civil rights organisations pressured Facebook on the issue, the company's privacy statement was revamped to state this clearly, TechCrunch reports. Facebook has already cut ties with developers that created surveillance tools, and is working with others to make sure that their apps are compliant with the policy.

The civil rights organisations called on social media companies to change their privacy policies after it was revealed that Facebook, Instagram and Twitter users' data was used to track Black Lives Matter activists. Twitter clarified its policy already in November, saying it prohibits the use of Twitter data for surveillance purposes.