Facebook has been making overtures towards the OpenID movement for months, after critics said Connect was a rival to OpenID. In February, Facebook joined the OpenID Foundation Board and hosted a "summit" about the OpenID user experience.

It will be interesting to see if Facebook puts OpenID on par with Connect, which has functionality beyond being a sign-in system, said industry analyst Greg Sterling [cq] from Sterling Market Intelligence.

For example, in addition to letting Facebook members log-in to partner sites with their Facebook credentials, Connect also lets them export their friend connections and certain information and content from their Facebook profiles.

Be that as it may, incorporating support for OpenID will be beneficial to Facebook because it gives the company an alternative way to stay connected to its members, Sterling said.