Exploiting Meta’s Weaknesses, Deceptive Political Ads Thrived on Facebook and Instagram in Run-Up to Election

ProPublica: Reporting Highlights

  • Deceptive Political Ads: Eight deceptive advertising networks have placed over 160,000 election and social issues ads across more than 340 Facebook pages in English and Spanish.
  • Harmed Users: Some of the people who clicked on ads were unwittingly signed up for monthly credit card charges or lost health coverage, among other consequences.
  • Spotty Enforcement: Meta removed some ads after first approving them, but it failed to catch others with similar or identical content — or to stop networks from launching new pages and ads.
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