With the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) set to go into effect on May 25, the Facebook-owned Oculus issued made a few privacy-related changes to comply with the upcoming rules.
Oculus’ New Privacy Changes
Oculus developed a new My Privacy Center, which is a new centralized location where you can manage your privacy settings. It also includes tools to view and download the data you’ve been sharing with the company. This tool will be available on May 20.
The updated Terms of Service and Privacy Policy will go into effect on May 20. The update will also include real-world examples of how Oculus uses your information “to create a better VR experience for you.”
Oculus will also add a Code of Conduct to its Terms to show users that the company cares about safe VR experiences.
Information Oculus Collects About Users
Oculus said that it doesn’t currently share its data with Facebook in order to target ads to users, but that doesn’t mean it won’t happen in the future. Facebook also said it wouldn’t use the Like button tracking data to target ads at users, and WhatsApp made a similar commitment before being purchased by Facebook. In both cases, Facebook ended up using that data to target ads.
Right now, users can also link their Oculus accounts to their Facebook accounts, in which case more data will be shared with Facebook.
Users will be able to see what information Oculus typically stores on them in the My Privacy Center, except for the following type of information:
De-identified information: We de-identify some information in our storage systems, so it's not associated with your account (for example, movement and position information).Information stored on your device: There is information that is stored only on the client device and not on our servers (for example, the height you provide).Information we need to protect: We don’t share specific things for security reasons, such as your credit card number to prevent it from being improperly accessed, as well as proprietary information.
Oculus also said that it will share device information such as the real-time current location of the headset and controllers with third-party developers. The company will also share who some of your friends are with third-party developers, when those friends use the same Oculus app as you do. Oculus said that it does this so you don’t have to recreate the Friends List for each app.
Oculus also noted that it constantly reviews how third-party developers use the data and promised to take action if they see developers abusing its terms or doing nefarious things with the data.
