With its 1.7 billion users worldwide, the Facebook social network is attacking online sales sites, such as Bon Coin or Ebay. Since Monday, thanks to mobile applications, Internet users in the United States, Australia, the United Kingdom and New Zealand can sell or buy items there. For the moment, Facebook has not specified the date of arrival of this service in France.
Facebook already claims nearly 450 million followers, who already use it to conduct business transactions. This time, operations will be even more simplified. If you are a buyer, the service will display items for sale by people near you. In addition, it will be possible to search by theme and price. For sellers, who must be over 18, it will suffice to take the photo of the object to put online.
Unlike its competitors, for the moment, this service does not offer seller ratings, which can leave the door open to dishonest sellers or scams. In addition, Facebook clarified that transactions and deliveries are not made via Facebook.
In the United States, the site of the daily newspaper USA Today has already noted numerous excesses, with advertisements for the sale of drugs, services for adults, but also sales of arms and organs… Suddenly, Mary Ku, director of product management at Facebook, apologized. According to her, a technical problem prevented the company from filtering messages that violate US law. “We are working to resolve this problem, she explains, adding that these messages will be identified and deleted.