Facebook’s quick fix hurts some businesses
New safeguards are creating a different kind of havoc — for app developers and consumers
Zendesk software engineer Austin Wang builds tools that convert Facebook users’ online complaints into customer service requests, but he found in April — without warning — he could no longer communicate directly with customers on the social network.
Facebook’s attempt to move fast and fix things, after its latest scandal over protecting users’ personal data, actually ended up breaking some independent apps that use Facebook and Messenger to reach customers. From customer service software to mobile games, virtual reality home listings and software for scheduling social media posts, Facebook had abruptly stripped away certain permissions for many independent developers’ apps.
Thousands of app developers gathered this week in San Jose for Facebook’s annual F8 developers conference, and many were seeking answers from Facebook about how it would fix what it had broken.
Wang waited at the conference for the social network to heed his call for help.
“Consumers are coming to us to complain, but there’s nothing we can do,” Wang said Tuesday. “We would like an alternate set of permissions for us to support business interactions.”
San Francisco-based Zendesk, just one of the app makers whose software was affected by Facebook’s changes, connects people through Facebook with customer service for more than 125,000 companies worldwide. The companies using Zendesk’s tools to offer Google is seeking to have its motion to de-certify the class action heard in court on July 12 or soon after.