Facebook is on the spot over recent allegations that Cambridge Analytica, a political consultancy firm, was able to inappropriately access data on 50 million of the social media site’s users, which it used to profile American voters and target them with adverts that helped ensure a win for President Donald Trump in 2016. While we ponder over the intricacies of this scandal, Internet Company, Mozilla, jumped in to save the day by taking a more innovative approach to protecting its Firefox browser users and their data.

Meet Mozilla’s Facebook Container

The company launched a new tool named Facebook Container, whose aim is to make it more difficult for Facebook to track user movement outside of its social network. The extension for Firefox internet browser, opens a new browser tab (container) that isolates your Facebook session, and any external links you click on while in Facebook, will open in a separate tab. Besides Facebook, Mozilla also added that they too would not be able to collect data that users upload to Facebook Container extension, and that all they will know is the frequency of installations or removals of the extension. When a user installs Facebook Container extension, Mozilla deletes Facebook cookies and logs you out of the session such that next time you visit Facebook, it opens up a new blue container tab, in which you can log in normally to the networking site, with the assurance that your private data won’t be shared.

RELATED: Data privacy transparency is what makes users trust or mistrust companies

Installing this extension means that if you click a non-Facebook link or navigate to a non-Facebook site in the URL bar, these will load outside the container. It also means that you won’t be able to log in to other websites using your Facebook credential, and, embedded comments and Like button features outside of the container tab also won’t work. In this way, Mozilla says, Facebook won’t be able to associate information about your online activity on other websites, to your Facebook identity. For more information on how to protect your personal data while online, check out the following guides:

16 best open source privacy software to protect personal information Privacy Eraser Pro deletes your browser activity protecting your privacy Your ISP can sell your browsing history: Here’s how to protect your privacy This firewall can block facial recognition protecting your privacy Protecting your personal data: Windows Privacy Tweaker is all you need

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