Facebook to bring Ad transparency tools ahead of India’s general elections in 2019

Owing to the general elections in India in 2019, Facebook announced that it is making big changes to the way it manages political ads on Facebook and Instagram. The company has already rolled out such changes in the US, Brazil, and the UK.  Now anyone who wants to run an ad in India related to politics will need to first confirm their identity and location, and give more details about who placed the ad. The identity and location confirmation will take a few weeks so advertisers can start that process early by using to submit proof of identity and location. The company also said that it will start showing a disclaimer on all political ads that provide more information about who’s placing the ad, and an online searchable Ad Library for anyone to access. This is a library of all ads related to politics from a particular advertiser as well as information like the budget associated with an individual ad, a range of impressions, as well as the demographics of who saw the ad. At that time, it will also begin to enforce the policy that requires all ads related to politics be run by an advertiser who’s completed the authorizations process and be labeled with the disclaimer. ...