Facebook has stopped third-parties from being able to post on behalf of the logged-in user since 1 August 2018. Alongside this, it also revoked permission to do so for previously allowed entities, like Twitter. But now it looks like Facebook is going a step further, by scrubbing all posts that were previously cross-posted from Twitter as well.
Facebook’s actions was reported by TechCrunch via a reader who discovered this, and who also found no info on the matter on Facebook’s Help Center. The publisher has since confirmed this with the social media service directly.
Others who also discovered the deletion of posts were few, and those who did were noted to be light users on Facebook, and as such noticed missing posts more easily. Heavier users who shared stuff often or are frequently tagged by friends are less likely to notice, considering the volume of posts that will go by.
A recent update to the Facebook Platform Policies ended the ability to automatically post Tweets to our Facebook profile or page and all of our previous Twitter posts were deleted by Facebook. #dfwwx #txwx #plano https://t.co/sAOsbdBjVO
— Plano, Texas Weather (@PlanoWX) August 24, 2018
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The most egregious part of this whole thing is probably the fact that Facebook users were not informed of this before it happened. It doesn’t look like there’s any public announcement that it will be part of the plan to remove third-party access either. Since the Facebook update merely prevents third-parties from posting on Facebook in the future, there’s no reason to think that previous posts made in this manner will also be removed.
Until Facebook makes an official statement, all we can do is wait and see. If you do a lot of cross-posting from Twitter to Facebook, it may be a good idea to check if your tweets are missing on Facebook as well.
(Source: TechCrunch)
