Facebook has decided not to limit how political ads are targeted to specific groups of people, as Google has done. Nor will it ban political ads, as Twitter has done. And it still won't fact check them, as it's faced pressure to do.
“Today’s announcement is more window dressing around their decision to allow paid misinformation,” said Bill Russo, a campaign spokesman for Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden.
For instance, they can use information gleaned from voter rolls, such as political affiliation, and try to reach just those people. Or they can narrow the target audience to those who have shown interest in guns, abortion or immigration, based on what the user has read or talked about on Facebook. Candidates might even show one ad to young Democratic women interested in both gun control and climate change, and a different ad to everyone else.
The company said it was guided by the principle that “people should be able to hear from those who wish to lead them, warts and all, and that what they say should be scrutinized and debated in public.” Facebook also called for government regulation of political ads, saying private companies should not be the ones to make rules about them. Experts say one of the big problems with political advertising online is the lack of a federal standard about what is and isn’t allowed.
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