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Facebook Inc. outlined plans to strengthen its advertisement systems and disclosed that about 10 million people saw ads linked to Russian efforts to influence the 2016 US presidential election.
The social media giant said it will add more than 1,000 people to review the ads that run on its platforms. Additionally, the company said it provided information on about 3,000 relevant ads to US congressional investigators.
In September, the company said that accounts affiliated with Russia bought more than $100,000 in election-related ads. That disclosure prompted a congressional probe, which now includes Twitter Inc. and Alphabet Inc.’s Google. The companies have been asked to testify before the House Intelligence Committee later this month and the Senate’s corresponding committee on November 1. Two weeks ago, Facebook Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg announced an overhaul to the rules around political ad spending and said the company would add 250 employees to work on election integrity. “I don’t want anyone to use our tools to undermine democracy,†Zuckerberg said in a video message.
While Facebook said it was bulking up the staff that review ad spending, it declined to offer details on the process. The company also introduced several updates to the ad-buying process, including tighter restrictions on content and improved rules to force advertisers to demonstrate their authenticity before they can make purchases.
Had these measures been in place prior to the election, “we believe we would have caught these malicious actors faster and prevented more improper ads from running,†Facebook Vice President of Policy and Communications Elliot Schrage wrote Monday in a blog post. He added that for half the ads, less than $3 was spent, and that $1,000 or more was spent on less than 1 percent of the ads.
Congressional Response
US Representative Adam Schiff, a California Democrat and the party’s ranking member on the House Intelligence Committee, isn’t sure whether Facebook’s announced changes will make a difference.
“If foreign countries are advertising in a way that is designed to divide us, as a lot of these ads were, is that something that, number one, they are going to be able to discover?†Schiff said. And if so, he asked, can the social media platform then stop and expose the action?
“I don’t have the answers to those questions. But I think those are some of the things we’re going to want to ask during the hearing,†Schiff said.
The company said its automated advertising system is designed to target users most interested in the topic of the messages. “But we know ad targeting can be abused, and we aim to prevent abusive ads from running on our platform,†Schrage wrote. “To begin, ads containing certain types of targeting will now require additional human review and approval.†A decision on whether to release personally identifiable information, such as the names of people who liked posts made by the suspect accounts, is the prerogative of Congress, indicating that no deal has been reached to keep such information private, according to a person familiar with the probe.
Facebook’s Schrage said it’s possible the company hasn’t discovered everything done on the platform by overseas interests to try to influence the 2016 election.