The Irish Data Protection Commissioner is to undertake an audit of Facebook’s activities outside the US and Canada next month following complaints over the retention of users’ information by the social networking giant.
The audit comes after the Europe Versus Facebook group lodged 22 complaints regarding the retention of users' information to the office of the Irish data commissioner.
As Facebook's European headquarters are based in Dublin, all its activities outside the US and Canada come under the remit of the Irish data commissioner's office.
The complaints include allegations that Facebook collect data about people without their knowledge and that this information is used to create profiles of non-users; that messages including chat messages are stored by Facebook even after the user deletes them; and that a new face recognition feature is a violation of the users right to privacy.
The office is due to begin the audit in the third week in October and hopes to publish its findings by the end of the year.
In a statement, Facebook said: "Facebook's European headquarters in Ireland manages the company's compliance with EU data protection law.
"We are in regular dialogue with the Irish Data Protection Commissioner and we look forward to demonstrating our commitment to the appropriate handling of user data as part of this routine
audit."