- General
- August 6, 2018
- 5 minutes read
Facebook said to request data from large U.S. Banks to build out its financial ecosystem
image credit : Flickr/Maurizio Pesce Facebook has reportedly requested several large U.S. banks for sharing of financial data concerning its…
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| image credit : Flickr/Maurizio Pesce |
Facebook has reportedly requested several large U.S. banks for sharing of financial data concerning its customers in a bid to ramp up efforts on its financial products ecosystem with The Wall Street Journal reporting of financial institutions being reluctant to co-operation over privacy concerns with one bank having pulled out of discussions with the social networking giant.
Data asked from the banks includes card transactions and checking account balances as per the report which comes after growth concerns have been raised concerning the company’s future strategy amid a privacy scandal eponymous with the Cambridge Analytica case.
Building out financial products would stand as another source of revenue for the company as it aims to broaden its revenue base other than its major advertising business which has slowed in growth partly due to several big brands pulling off ads from its platform over the wake of the scandal and the market being quite saturated.
Facebook is said to have asked JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Citigroup and U.S. Bancorp to discuss potential services it could host on its Messenger platform for its customers.
The company also make known to the Wall Street Journal that it wouldn’t share the data with 3rd parties or make use of it for ad targeting.
“We don’t use purchase data from banks or credit card companies for ads,” Facebook Spokeswoman Elisabeth Diana told the Journal. “We also don’t have special relationships, partnerships, or contracts with banks or credit card companies to use their customers’ purchase data for ads.”
Financial Data could be used to power products like its Marketplace service with fraud alerts and account balances also capable of being accessed by users on its Messenger platform which could count as a boost for it.
But with financial data being very sensitive and a key part of the consumer ecosystem, Banks might be reluctant to continue talks over data sharing due to privacy among other concerns. In the long run, We’ll get to know if the large banks would be willing to co-operate with the Menlo Park based company for financial services to be made for its users.
