Facebook expanding transparency on Political Ads in Kenya and Ethiopia

Facebook is expanding two initiatives focused on increasing transparency and controls on social issues, electoral, and political ads to more countries around the world, including Ethiopia and Kenya.

The first one is focused on empowering people to have more control over the ads they see on their feeds which entails the creation of controls that enable people to see fewer social issues, electoral, and political ads.

This expansion follows the rollout in the US and Brazil in 2020 and covers an additional 98 countries including Ethiopia and Kenya which will hold general elections this May and in 2022 respectively.

“When people use this control, they’ll no longer see ads that run with a “Paid for by” disclaimer”. Political ads play an important role in every election. The feedback received from Facebook users was that they wanted the option to see fewer of these on their Facebook and Instagram feeds.” Facebook’s Policy Director, Africa Kojo Boakye said.

Users can enable the social issue, electoral, and political ads controls by adjusting their ad topic preferences on Facebook.

In addition, Facebook is expanding the enforcement of social issues, electoral, and political ads to 20 additional countries.

Previously, advertisers in these countries may have chosen to use these tools. Now, they will be required to go through the authorization process and place “Paid for by” disclaimers on their ads. This includes any person creating, modifying, publishing or pausing ads that reference political figures, political parties or elections (including “get out the vote” campaigns). Ads will also be entered into Facebook’s Ad Library for seven years.

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