Isn’t that cute? Facebook has yet another partnership, and this time it’s with a company that tracks your real-life purchases, links it with your online ad experiences and then hands that info to Facebook. Sounds so familiar and just as annoying as previous attempts by social networking sites to make money off its free users. Ahem.

Anyway, Datalogix is hooking up with Facebook but you don’t have to be a part of their happy union.

The Financial Times says Facebook’s new pal Datalogix has the ability to track when you see an ad on a social network and then click through to actually buy the item, or get it in stores. Of course, Facebook thinks this is a fantastic plan.

“We kept hearing back [from marketers] that we needed to push further and help them do a better job,” said Facebook’s head of measurement and insights.

Datalogix already has a huge amount of data on American consumers from loyalty cards and store rewards programs — about 70 million households dealing with more than 1,000 retailers. All it has to do then is match up email addresses or whathaveyou and then link all that information together to find out if you ended up buying something that was advertised to you on Facebook.

Facebook is now paying Datalogix for that data-matching service, but if you don’t want to be a part of it, click on over to Datalogix’s privacy page, scroll down to “Choice” and click on the link there to opt out. I did it and I feel pretty darn liberated.

Facebook raises fears with ad tracking [Financial Times]

Want more consumer news? Visit our parent organization, Consumer Reports, for the latest on scams, recalls, and other consumer issues.