Facebook Adds More Ways to Export Photos and Videos to Dropbox as Part of Data Portability Initiative
After giving users to capability to export their posted photos and videos to Google Photos last December – the first step in its broader Data Portability Initiative – Facebook is now also facilitating the transfer of your Facebook visual content to Dropbox and Koofr, as it continues to explore new options in this respect.
As explained by Facebook:
“We’ve long believed that if you share data with one service, you should be able to move it safely and securely to another. […] For almost a decade, we’ve enabled people to download their information from Facebook. Earlier this year, we rolled out a photo and video transfer tool with Google Photos, and, based on feedback from users and experts, we’ve started to make it easy to transfer to other platforms.”
As you can see here, now, when you go to transfer your Facebook visual content, you’ll be able to choose from the three options as to where you want to download your content to.
As noted, the update is part of Facebook’s push to improve data portability – last September; Facebook published a new white paper that outlined the challenges of the process, with a view to establishing a more uniform, industry-standard practice for facilitating data transfers between digital properties.
Facebook refers to that paper in its new announcement and the ongoing discussion of the process:
“We hope this tool can advance conversations with experts, developers, and policymakers on the privacy questions we identified in our data portability white paper and recent submission to the Federal Trade Commission.”
Indeed, Facebook says that it can’t build such a framework on its own; it needs the backing of legislators in order to make data portability a more definitive right for all users.
But, for Facebook, now you have more options. Not everyone will care, but it’s important that the platforms provide options for you to be able to claim your content, especially with respect to industry competition and the capacity for users to move to other apps and tools, if they so choose.
The new options are now available on Facebook.
