Facebook has removed accounts, pages and apps linked to firms which build facial recognition software for the Russian government. The social media giant announced on Thursday it had removed 66 accounts associated with SocialDataHub and its sister firm Fubutech. It said the companies had violated Facebook policy by scraping data from the social network. 'Facebook has reason to believe your work for the government has included matching photos from individuals' personal social media accounts in order to identify them,' the company said in a cease-and-desist letter to SocialDataHub, The New York Times reported. The companies involved, which share 52 employees in Moscow, were reportedly given until yesterday to confirm what data they had taken and delete it.