Facebook is reportedly working on its own photo sharing app for Apple's iPhone after images of the new feature leaked online. "The best way to think about it appears to be Path meets Instagram meets Color, with a few cool twists," reports Techcrunch, which claims it has received approximately 50MB worth of images and specs. Few details of the feature have been released but Facebook will be looking to cash in on photo sharing, which is becoming a lucrative online currency.

Although Facebook has not confirmed the rumours, the reports are likely to cause concern among third-party app developers that already operate on the social network. If confirmed, the move would be further indication that social networks are looking to tighten their grip on their ecosystems, capitalising on hot spaces such as photos. Twitter is pulling photo-sharing features on the site in-house and is expected to launch its own service, allowing users to pin images to their tweets.

Content sharing is becoming a hot space, with social networks playing an increasingly powerful role in the coverage of current events as sources of real time photos, videos and real-time commentary. With apps such as Imageshack, Yfrog and Pixable attracting million-dollar backing from investors, some commentators claim that it makes sense for Facebook to bring the revenue streams in-house.