Yesterday, Facebook announced updated terms of service for third party advertising and offer providers on the Facebook Platform. You can see our full analysis here.

Most of the terms relate to compliance with all existing Facebook terms of service and advertiser policies. However, one part in particular relates to the disclosure of third party information – including “payment details” – for any third party ad provider on the Platform. It reads (emphasis added):

3. The ad provider agrees to provide to Facebook the names, email addresses, and business addresses of all operators and employees of the ad provider and any other related information requested by Facebook for the purpose of maintaining a direct relationship with the ad provider. The ad provider also agrees to share with Facebook the contact information, implementation specifics and payment details, for each developer or application on Facebook for which the ad provider provides services.

We asked Facebook for more information on what it meant exactly by “payment details” in the new terms. i.e. Does that mean that third party monetization providers must share developer revenue numbers, revenue sharing terms, and the like, with Facebook?

The company told that payment information “will only be requested if there is a very clear need to do so.”

What we believe Facebook means by this is that they will only request this kind of sensitive financial data from third parties when substantial questions arise about the legitimacy of what either party is doing in order to investigate potential abuse. Nevertheless, many people in the developer ecosystem are concerned about the theoretical possibilities that could occur according to a strict reading of the new terms.

Ultimately, while we do not think Facebook is going to suddenly go around asking everybody to disclose their finances, this is the first instance that we are aware of in which Facebook has explicitly written a condition like this into the Platform terms of service. It’s a reflection of how Facebook views its expanding role in Platform governance – if you’re doing something suspicious or abusive, Facebook is reserving the right to look at your books and see where the money’s going.