Facebook Rolls Out Tool to Transfer Photos, Videos to Google Photos

Facebook announced Thursday that it would start rolling out a tool that lets users in Canada and the US easily transfer photos and videos from the platform to Google Photos.

Late last year, Facebook launched a new service to let people more easily transfer their images and videos from the social network to Google Photos. It trialed the feature in Ireland, but is now rolling it out more widely, with users in Canada and the US getting access as of today.

To access the photo transfer tool, Facebook users will need to click on “Settings” and then select “Your Facebook Information.” From there, look for the “Transfer a Copy of Your Photos or Videos” option. After a quick identity confirmation, the next page will let users download the content or transfer it to Google Photos, which will require logging into a Google account for authentication.

In a blog post about the feature, Steve Satterfield, Facebook’s director of privacy and public policy, said that the tool is rooted in the principle that “if you share data with one service, you should be able to move it to another”. While users have long been able to download their data from Facebook, and could then upload it elsewhere, the new tool should make it far easier and less laborious to do so.

Facebook has said that Google Photos is only the first service the platform is partnering with for photo transfers, but has hinted that users will be able to transfer Facebook data to other online services in the future.

The ability to move data between services is not all Facebook’s doing or idea. In 2018, Facebook, Google, Apple, Microsoft, and Twitter launched the Data Transfer Project. The initiative is designed to promote data portability between services. It’s an open-source project that aims to provide direct and seamless data transfer between services from competing platforms.

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