Facebook says police can’t use its data for ‘surveillance’

Facebook is cutting police departments off from a vast trove of data that has been increasingly used to monitor protesters and activists. The move, which the social network announced March 13, comes in the wake of concerns over law enforcement’s tracking of protesters’ social media accounts in places such as Ferguson (MO) and Baltimore (MD). It also comes at a time when chief executive Mark Zuckerberg says he is expanding the company’s mission from merely “connecting the world” into friend networks to promoting safety and community.

Although the social network’s core business is advertising, Facebook, along with Twitter and Facebook-owned Instagram, also makes money by selling developers access to users’ public feeds. The developers use the data to monitor trends and public events.