Impact of Facebook data privacy changes on WatchGuard Wi-Fi Cloud
Dear Wi-Fi Cloud User,
WatchGuard values the privacy of everyone's personal data. We take steps to ensure security and data privacy throughout our products and company infrastructure. Facebook recently announced new compliance requirements that went into effect on August 1, 2018 about the storage and use of opt-in demographic profile information (age and gender) collected from guest Wi-Fi users.
What you need to know:
- Wi-Fi Cloud currently fetches the profile data of opt-in guest Wi-Fi users from several social media plug-ins (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, and FourSquare) and displays age and gender distribution of guest Wi-Fi users in the Analyze application.
- Some Facebook users currently do not allow their age and/or gender to be available publicly on their profile, and the data for these users appears in the "Unspecified" category in Analyze reports.
- Due to these heightened compliance requirements from Facebook, after April 1st, 2019, opt-in profile information of guest Wi-Fi users in the Wi-Fi Cloud-managed Facebook app will no longer gather information such as age and gender, and this data will appear as "Unspecified" in Analyze reports.
- Analyze reports will continue to display demographic data collected through Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, FourSquare, Guestbook and Web Form plug-ins.
Demographics data today:
When the demographics data from Facebook is stopped from being collected:
Although Wi-Fi Cloud will no longer store the demographic data captured through Facebook plug-ins, users who want to continue to store opt-in Facebook profile information of guest Wi-Fi users can do so in these ways:
- Configure a third-party end point in Wi-Fi Cloud to redirect Facebook demographic data to your own company server(s). For more information, see Configure End Points for Third-Party Integration.
- Get your own app registered and approved with Facebook to be able to use Facebook analytics data. You can then use your approved Facebook app with Wi-Fi Cloud Analyze to collect the profile information of guest Wi-Fi users and send it to your own server end point. This Facebook data will not be stored in Wi-Fi Cloud. For more information on how to create your own social media apps for use with Wi-Fi Cloud, see Create Social Media Plug-in Apps.
Please contact WatchGuard Support at watchguard.com/support if you have any additional questions.
Sincerely,
WatchGuard Wi-Fi Team