Facebook's 'Clear History' Tool Delayed Yet Again, Company Cites Need to 'Re-Engineer' Data Processing

News about the much-anticipated 'Clear History' tool feature that Facebook was supposed to roll out in spring this year has been delayed even further. Mark Zuckerberg first announced the feature in May 2018 at Facebook's annual F8 conference. The new tool was initially set to release last year itself with no concrete details mentioned about a set date. But then it was delayed to arrive by Spring 2019 and if we go by latest reports, the feature is once again delayed and is now being prepped to release by Fall 2019.

According to a report by Engadget, Guy Rosen, Facebook's VP of Integrity has confirmed that the 'Clear History' tool is not ready yet and will now arrive by Fall this year. Rosen stated, “We're working to re-engineer our systems, and how we process that data so that we can do it right. That's why it's taking more time than anticipated.”

The idea of this “Clear tool” feature is simple. Mark Zuckerberg had described this to be as simple as clicking a button, just like people are used to erasing their browser history. However, Zuckerberg also added that this tool would also hamper the Facebook experience in a similar fashion to when you delete your cookies. What this means is that you'll have to sign back into every website and reconfigure things as Facebook will to relearn about your activities all over again.

It's almost been a year since Facebook had announced the “Clear tool” feature. Notably, it was around that time when Facebook was embroiled in a legal battle regarding the Cambridge Analytica Privacy scandal.

Facebook's head of the privacy product team at in December revealed that the Clear History won't arrive until the Spring of 2019. In February this year, we received a vague timeline of later this year.