Social networking giant Facebook has reached a privacy settlement with the  U.S. Federal Trade Commission, WSJ reported. The company has been under intense international scrutiny  due to a rather lengthy list of blunders involving users’ personal data, and the FTC plans to make sure these kinds of incidents won’t happen again.

“Facebook is obligated to keep the promises about privacy that it makes to its hundreds of millions of users,” FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz said in a statement. “Facebook’s innovation does not have to come at the expense of consumer privacy. The FTC action will ensure it will not.”

The settlement includes an order asking Facebook to provide periodic reviews of its privacy practices by an independent auditor throughout the next 20 years, similarly to Google and Twitter. In addition, Facebook now requires users’ consent before implementing privacy changes and will delete profiles that haven’t been active for 30 days.

Lastly, should Facebook not comply with these new restrictions it faces a fine of $16,000 per violation per day, a sum that can really add up when one considers the social network has 800 million users.

One of the first measures the company has taken in light of the FTC’s decision is the appointment of two new Chief Privacy Officers.  The settlement is still not conclusive, but there is a high probability it will pass through, which means Facebook better start preparing now.

Over in Europe, the EU is also taking measures to ensure Facebook maintains its users’ data private.  A directive due in May aims to prohibit targeted marketing unless a user agrees to it.  This may prove to be a challenge for Facebook, and a decline in ad revenues from European users would likely have an impact on the success of the company’s upcoming public offering.