Facebook has entered discussions with major U.S. banks in an attempt to gain access to customer data, the Wall Street Journal reports. The exact timing of the request is not clear, but talks are reported to be currently ongoing.
At a time when Facebook’s data management is under intense scrutiny, this news is unlikely to be greeted enthusiastically by customers of those banks called out in the story — JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Citigroup, and U.S. Bancorp.
According to the report, Facebook has asked banks “to discuss potential offerings it could host for bank customers on Facebook Messenger,” as well as offer a feature to display checking account balances. The sticking point for banks, unsurprisingly, is data privacy. One bank, not named, has reportedly pulled out of the discussions for privacy concerns.
“Facebook has told banks that the additional customer information could be used to offer services that might entice users to spend more time on Messenger,” according to the story, which also noted the data will not be used for ad targeting purposes or shared with third parties. Facebook has pulled in $11.8 billion in advertising revenue in the U.S. and Canada so far in 2018.
Facebook had previously offered some form of access to customer data to the Royal Bank of Canada, as covered on Bank Innovation recently. The access is said to have ended years ago — by the end of 2015, RBC no longer was in possession of Facebook data, according to the social media company.





