Smartphone photo sharing service Instagram has refined its privacy policy to clear the way for sharing data with Facebook, which bought the company earlier this year.
“Nothing has changed about your photos’ ownership or who can see them,” Instagram said in a blog post.
“Our updated privacy policy helps Instagram function more easily as part of Facebook by being able to share info between the two groups.”
The changes were slated to take effect January 16.
However, some blogs were quick to point out that Instagram's new policy also paves the way for the company to sell the use of usernames, profile pictures, photos taken by the user and records of what they've liked or commented on to other companies.
Instagram maintained that the coming updates to its privacy policy and terms of service will help it improve the reliability of the service and fight spam.