HasOffers and Kontagent are out of Facebook’s mobile marketing partner program. The social network dropped the two companies for policy violations including holding onto data too long and not requiring advertisers to update their privacy policies to notify users of data collection,
AdExhanger is reporting.
According to the report, the app developers that rely on HasOffers and Kontagent for tracking downloads and monetization performance of their app install campaigns on Facebook will no longer have access to this data. Both companies have been removed from Facebook’s list of mobile measurement qualified companies and will not be allowed to bring on new advertisers.
“After working with a third-party auditor to review the practices of all our mobile measurement partners, we discovered that some weren’t adhering to the terms they agreed to,” Facebook said in a statement to AdExchanger. “As a result, we’ve removed a couple of our partners from the program. We take our contracts seriously, and will continue to act swiftly anytime we find out they are being violated.”
This isn’t the first time HasOffers has run afoul of Facebook policies. In September 2013, VentrureBeat reported that HasOffers acknowledged it had been distributing “non-aggregated and non-anonymized device-level data” about Facebook users to its app developer advertisers through its MobileAppTracking platform. The company issued a statement to customers saying it had updated the platform to distribute only aggregated and anonymized device-level data.
Guillaume Lelait, VP of North America for mobile marketing agency Fetch, predicts the companies’ expulsion “will send ripples through the mobile app industry” as a significant number of “big app developers have been using HasOffers Mobile App Tracking for attribution of all channels (including Facebook) for measurement”.
Facebook reported over half its earnings came from mobile in its Q4 earnings statement and continues to focus on building out its mobile business. As AdExchanger points out, the move to drop the two partners signals to Facebook’s other PMDs, users and investors that it’s taking user privacy and data security seriously.
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