Facebook doubles the time needed to delete an account

Facebook has doubled the amount of time that users need to wait before a request to delete their profile is honoured. — dpa

Facebook has doubled the amount of time that users need to wait before a request to delete their profile is honoured.

Instead of waiting 14 days, anyone who wants to leave Facebook forever now has to wait 30 days before their profile and all of its data is indefinitely removed from their social media platform, according to platform's help section.

The change comes in a year of user backlash against Facebook, which has been dogged by a privacy scandal that saw tens of millions of users' private information being exposed to a third party that used it to influence major political outcomes.

Facebook says it wants to give any user who has decided to leave their site a window of 30 days when they can still log into the website and click "Cancel Deletion" to keep using the platform as if nothing had changed. – dpa