Facebook , which set down itself in the crosshairs after becoming one of the primary venues by whichfederal public prosecutor allegea Kremlin - linked , pro - Donald Trump Russian operation hollo the Internet Research Agency attempt to flood the US with disinformation and propaganda before the 2016 elections , now pronounce it will verify the identity of mass who buy election - colligate advertizement by post postal card .
Per Reuters , Facebook say the procedure will involve any advertising that mentions a specific candidate , but not general issue - base advert :
The process of using postcards containing a specific code will be required for advertising that bring up a specific candidate running for a federal part , Katie Harbath , Facebook ’s globular director of policy programs , said . The demand will not apply to issue - based political ads , she enounce .
“ If you incline an advertising mentioning a candidate , we are live on to mail you a post card and you will have to use that code to prove you are in the United States , ” Harbath said at a weekend conference of the National Association of Secretaries of State , where executive from Twitter Inc and Alphabet Inc ’s Google also spoke .
“ It wo n’t solve everything , ” Harbath sound out in a brief consultation with Reuters following her remark .
According to Reuters , Facebook says the mailer are the best answer they could come up with and that they would be in use before the 2018 midterm election schedule for November .
Though Russian groups purchased around $ 100,000 in ads on Facebook , it also produced a much larger raiment of unpaid content for the site that finally make up to 126 million Americans on Facebook and 20 million on foot soldier website Instagram — a number that sounds declamatory , but is also “ a flyspeck contribution of the 33 trillion Wiley Post Americans saw in their Facebook news feeds between 2015 and 2017 , ” theWashington Post note . The plowshare that were reached by the Russian - pay ads came in at just 10 million of that aggregate .
Federal natural law prohibits foreign entity from making any kinds of using up or contribution towards any electoral campaign in the US , as well as requires nominee committees , company committees , and political action commission to let out how they spend money ( though growing amounts ofdark money spendingby non - profit groups that do n’t have to disclose their giver is increasingly an issue ) .
According to theWashington Post , however , Facebook ’s terms of service stipulate that advertiser have obligation for “ understanding and complying with all applicable laws and regulations . ” As intelligence of the alleged Russian operation has alarmed legislators , some observer have characterized its reception as intended to preclude any fix that could affect its extremely profitable andlargely automated targeted advertising model . For years , Bloomberg report , Facebook has long look for Federal Election Commission exemptions from political advert disclosure , and its policy of leaving compliance to ad purchaser has helped it “ bring forth hundreds of millions of dollars in political campaign spots . ”
Since the novel policy apparently only applies to ads direct mention candidates by name , it would apply tomany but not allof the ad buy by the Russian chemical group during the election season .
News of the postcard annunciation may have been briefly overshadowed , however , by Trump ’s decision to retweet aFacebook advertising executivewho had tried to outdistance the Russian performance from the termination of the elections .
[ Reuters ]
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