Some Popular Android Apps Still Share User Personal Data With Facebook

On Tuesday, Privacy International – a UK watchdog group – said that some Android apps have no longer shared its data with Facebook, but others still do.

In December, German mobile security firm Mobilsicher and Privacy International released reports saying that lots of widely used apps were sharing its user data with Facebook automatically, even when they don’t use the social network or have logged out of its platform. They both examined several iOS apps.

According to the London charity, Duolingo, Yelp, the King James Bible, Indeed, Muslim Pro, and Qibla Connect still share data without permission. Meanwhile, Privacy International’s report indicates that Kayak, Skyscanner, and Spotify have updated their apps to block connection with Facebook when users open the apps.

Not only did the watchdog report this issue to the European Data Protection Supervisor and the European Data Protection Board, but it also reached to the apps. Duolingo promised to remove the app events feature of the Facebook Software Developer Kit from its iOS an Android app versions in its next update. The app also thanked Privacy International for acknowledging them of the issue.

Meanwhile, Yelp denied sharing user personal information from its Android apps with the social network. According to an email from Yelp, it runs ad campaigns for its apps on the social network, which means when users launch the app, it may send an anonymous advertising ID of the device to Facebook. Yelp wrote that the use is included in its Privacy Policy which users can go to Android settings to deny access to the advertising ID whenever they want.

In Facebook policies, the social network says that it can collect information on users through third-party apps using SDKs and APIs. Apps that are integrated with SDK offer features such as analytics or allowance of login with Facebook.

The other apps didn’t respond immediately to comment requests and neither did Facebook.