Introducing Graph v9.0 and Marketing API v9.0

Today, we’re releasing Graph API v9.0 and Marketing API v9.0. Some updates may require developer action, while others are shared to keep you informed. In this update, we’re also sharing upcoming deprecations. Visit the Platform Initiatives Hub to stay informed of other planned improvements.

Developer Action Required

User Data Deletion Requests:

Starting November 10, 2020, Consumer & Gaming app types submitting for App Review, or transitioning from Development Mode to Live Mode, will be required to provide a data deletion request callback, or a URL with explicit instructions for users on how to request their data be deleted. We plan to fully enforce this requirement by November 10, 2022. Apps that have not submitted for App Review or transitioned from Development Mode to Live Mode by this date will receive reminder alerts with additional instructions.

Lead Ads Restriction:

Due to new requirements that Facebook has placed on third-party apps with access to user data applications, certain apps that connect advertisers' CRM systems with Facebook’s API may lose the ability to retrieve and pass data from Lead Ads campaigns.

If developers upgrade to Graph API v9.0 and want to keep retrieving Lead Ads forms data, they need to complete App Review:

• Business apps must request Advanced Access for the leads_retrieval permission before upgrading
• Non-business apps must switch to Live Mode and request leads_retrieval before upgrading

All developers that do not upgrade to Graph v9.0 have until February 9th, 2021 to submit an App Review request for leads_retrieval. After this date, apps still using leads_retrieval with Graph API v8.0 or lower with Standard Access (business apps) or in Development Mode (non-business apps) will receive failed data calls when attempting to retrieve Lead Ads data.

Recent Policy Updates and Changes

US 2020 Live API:

As of October 22, we’ve updated our policies to better protect people from deceptive or purposely harmful content shared on Facebook Live. Pre-recorded and looping Live videos are now prohibited from both the Live API and Core Live. Broadcasts via the Live API or core Live must not contain looping content (videos, static images, or poll-only videos) and any pre-recorded content must be clearly labeled.

In addition, Facebook Live broadcasts cannot be used to mislead others that the broadcast is taking place in an inaccurate location—for example, claiming that footage is happening in a particular locale when it is not.

Learn more about Facebook Live Policies.

Crawler Access to Privacy Policies and URLs:

As part of our ongoing efforts to protect people's privacy on Facebook, we use crawlers to ensure that URLs are live and accessible to people using third party apps. As such URLs must be publicly available. We're updating our policies to ensure developers allow our crawler to access URLs specified in apps’ settings. This includes any developer-controlled URLs, including the privacy policy URL, connect URL, and other product-specific URLs.

Learn more about the Facebook Crawler.

Instant Games:

As part of our ongoing efforts to protect people's privacy and the data they entrust to us when they use third-party apps, we are updating our Developer Policies around Instant Games and the data they request from people (s7.4). The group of policies within s7.4 prohibits the creation of user profiles utilizing data requested via Instant Games. As such, we are publishing an additional policy (s7.4i) that will further prohibit an Instant Game from independently requesting any personal or sensitive data from people in your Instant Game.

Learn more about our Developer Policies.

Bot Policy Change:

In compliance with applicable law, automated chat experiences (example: bots) will be required to inform users that they’re interacting with an automated experience. This update is particularly relevant to bots that serve the German market and German users.

Learn more about updated Bot Policies.

No Action Required. For Your Information Only

The following announcements do not require action today. They are meant to keep you informed about other changes on our platform.

Instagram Follower Count Metric Update:

As part of our ongoing commitment to improving the metrics that help partners measure their performance, we are updating the follower_count metric on the Instagram Insights API. As of November 10th, your users may notice a one-time decrease in their follower count shown via API, as it more closely aligns with the follower count shown in the native app. We also make routine product updates to ensure that Instagram is a safe and open community for everyone. As part of these continuous improvements, insights data for the follower_count metric will now only be available for the last 30 days.

Instagram Ads API Improvements:

We are excited to announce several improvements to the Instagram Ads API. Advertisers continue to rely heavily on third-party solutions and desktop tools enabled by the Instagram Ads API to better manage their Instagram advertising strategies and campaigns across distributed teams. We are introducing several technical changes that will now give your users the ability to take existing organic Instagram posts and promote them as ads. We will also begin returning the Instagram Graph API’s user ID on the Instagram Ads API and several other endpoints, offering a more unified developer experience between the Ads and Graph API platforms.

Learn more in the changelog.

Update to Access of POST:Business/business_user, POST:Business/system_user, & POST/<APP_SCOPED_SYSTEM_USER_ID>/access_tokens:

We are removing access to POST /{business-id}/business_users, POST /{business-id}/system_users, and POST/<APP_SCOPED_SYSTEM_USER_ID>/access_tokens for developers who haven’t used these endpoints in the past 90 days. We're working on changes to these permissions and will share updates soon.

Version Deprecations:

• February 8, 2021 - v6.0 of the Marketing API will no longer be available.
• March 3, 2021 - v7.0 of the Marketing API will no longer be available.
• May 4th, 2021 - v3.2 of the Graph API will no longer be available.