Senate Committee Pushes Facebook, Twitter, Google for Political Ad Disclosures

Internet companies committed to providing more transparency in online political advertisements in response to pointed questions during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing Tuesday on Russian disinformation campaigns during the 2016 elections. Lawyers for Facebook, Twitter and Google said they took steps to eradicate attempts by foreign actors to influence U.S. elections with online ads, and are fully cooperating with investigations. “Our commitment to solving this problem is unwavering,” said Colin Stretch, Facebook general counsel.

The company found fake accounts associated with a Russia-based ad agency that spent about $100,000 on more than 3,000 Facebook and Instagram ads between June 2015 and August, Stretch said. The accounts used ads to promote the “roughly 120 Facebook Pages they had set up, which in turn posted more than 80,000 pieces of content between January 2015 and August 2017,” said prepared testimony. The company subsequently shut down the accounts and now is investigating how bad actors “misused our platform,” he told the committee.

Facebook will keep the committee updated on continuing investigations, Stretch told Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa. Company efforts “sweeping across all our platforms” are aimed at identifying and eradicating fake accounts, Stretch said. Nearly 10,000 employees are focused on solving the problem, including experts with “significant expertise” identifying terrorist content, he said. In response to a question from Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., Stretch said Iran and North Korea pose an “equal threat” as Russia in attempts to meddle with platforms.

Google recognizes its "services can be misused but we’ve dedicated significant resources to fighting attacks," said Richard Salgado, director-law enforcement and information security. An internal investigation found “limited” instances of ad purchases by “state-affiliated actors” in connection with the U.S. election, it blogged Monday. Two accounts linked to the Russia-based Internet Research Agency spent $4,700 on search and display ads that weren't narrowly targeted to specific groups of users, Google said, saying it found 18 YouTube channels “likely associated” with Russia-backed efforts “that appeared to be political,” with 1,108 videos updated totaling 309,000 U.S. views from June 2015 to November 2016.

Twitter's first priority was to block and remove malicious activity, and using detection tools it identified 36,746 accounts that generated automated, election-related content and had at least one of characteristic "we used to associate an account with Russia," said Sean Edgett, acting general counsel. "There are technological limits to what we can determine based on the information we can detect regarding a user’s origin."

Twitter and Facebook announced new transparency measures last week (see 1710250036). Twitter plans a “transparency center” offering users visibility into who's advertising and offering details behind the ads, including information on ads targeted to an individual and why the person was targeted. Facebook said it’s launching policies it will test in Canada and have up and running in the U.S. before midterm elections that will require all ads to be associated with a page at the start of the creation process. Users will be able to click “view ads” on a page and see content.

“How could you be aware of the origin" of all the advertisements on the platform? Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., asked Stretch, querying whether Facebook has the ability to detect shell corporations. Stretch said the company closely tracks its platforms, but it doesn't have visibility into every single transaction. Kennedy pressed Stretch on whether Facebook could probe every aspect of Kennedy’s life. Stretch said it wouldn't be possible.

Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., asked Facebook, Twitter and Google to support a bill she sponsored, the Honest Ads Act (S-1989), with companion House legislation (HR-4077). Company executives declined to commit, with each saying they've already incorporated provisions in the legislation in proactive steps. Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., a co-sponsor of S-1989, told reporters he wants a fuller explanation of what happened in the elections, and details from the companies on how they can work with Congress to prevent future problems. Warner referred to his “light-touch regulation” bill that "doesn’t get at all the problems but will guarantee that Americans will know the content of political ads," he said. The legislation would require large digital platforms to maintain a publicly available file of all requests to run ads that cost more than $500 within a calendar year.