Facebook has launched a new tool that will allow users to quickly and easily transfer all the photos they’ve posted on Facebook to their Google Photos account. The move is a win for advocates who have long complained that Facebook tries to lock user data into its platform. Though Facebook has long allowed users to download the data they’ve posted, the tool is a first for the company in that it easily transfers your data from one service to another.
The new tool is born out of the Data Transfer Project, a pact between Apple, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, and Twitter to provide a service-to-service data portability platform that lets users of one service easily transfer their data to a competing service.
While Facebook’s tool currently only works with Google Photos, it’s expected the tool will support more competing services in the future. Facebook has also previously announced a similar tool is coming to Instagram. However, Facebook users (or those who want to flee) shouldn’t get too excited. The new tool is only launching in Ireland for now. In a blog post, Facebook says “worldwide availability [of the tool is] planned for the first half of 2020.”
You can check out the new tool here.
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