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posted by Fnord666 on Monday November 25 2019, @01:16PM   Printer-friendly
from the a-step-in-the-right-direction dept.

Google bans microtargeting and "false claims" in political ads

The country's largest digital advertising platform is trying to take a stand heading into the 2020 election this week, as it both limits the targeting of political ads and warns would-be political advertisers about making false claims.

On Wednesday, Google made an announcement "clarifying" its advertising policy for political ads, making it clear that outright lies are theoretically not welcome. "Whether you're running for office or selling office furniture, we apply the same ads policies to everyone; there are no carve-outs," the company said, adding:

It's against our policies for any advertiser to make a false claim—whether it's a claim about the price of a chair or a claim that you can vote by text message, that election day is postponed, or that a candidate has died.

To make this more explicit, we're clarifying our ads policies and adding examples to show how our policies prohibit things like "deep fakes" (doctored and manipulated media), misleading claims about the census process, and ads or destinations making demonstrably false claims that could significantly undermine participation or trust in an electoral or democratic process.

That said, the company adds, they can't judge "every political claim, counterclaim, and insinuation," so they expect the number of ads they block to be low.

Those ads will also have to be aimed at a comparatively broad segment of the population, Google said, to the dismay of campaigns on both the left and the right. While the company will allow political ads to be targeted to users based on age, gender, and postal code, it will not allow more narrow "microtargeting" to highly segmented, granular audiences such as those based on public voter records or political affiliation.

Back to you, Facebook


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  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by meustrus on Monday November 25 2019, @10:11PM (2 children)

    by meustrus (4961) on Monday November 25 2019, @10:11PM (#924665)

    In the OP, Israel is in the boogeyman position. It would make sense from an American perspective to decry that Google is largely a Russian operation, because Russia is our primary adversary on the world stage.

    Israel, however, is an American ally. Putting them in the boogeyman position asserts that they are bad, whereas putting Russia there would lean on the mostly-accepted assumption that Russia is bad.

    And why is Israel bad? The question wasn't even acknowledged in the OP. We can speculate what JMH thinks is wrong with Israel and what that has to do with Google being evil by association. Frankly, the treatment of the Palestinians has nothing to do with Google.

    Think about it. Yes, most Muslims subject to Google have no representation in Google. Most Jews don't either. Most Christians, Hindus, Buddhists, and atheists have no representation either. Really, none of us have representation in Google because they are a corporation. We have about as much representation in Google as anybody does in North Korea. And I sincerely hope you are not about to claim that Israel is somehow worse than North Korea.

    To summarize, there is literally no reason presented to support the implicit assertion that Israel is bad. If JMH called Google a French operation, I'd be shrugging my shoulders trying to figure out what that could possibly mean. But since it's Israel, my bet is he meant they're bad because they're Jews.

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    If there isn't at least one reference or primary source, it's not +1 Informative. Maybe the underused +1 Interesting?
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  • (Score: 2) by Username on Tuesday November 26 2019, @12:47PM (1 child)

    by Username (4557) on Tuesday November 26 2019, @12:47PM (#924887)

    How is Israel an ally? Because they buy our bombs? What have they ever done for America? They are tiny country the size of Chicago. They exist entirely by the good grace of the United States. They will try to influence the US to keep it this way by any means necessary. It makes total sense for them to try and skew what american's think. I have yet to see a discussion on what Israel is doing to the indigenous Palestinians where it isn't deflected or called antisemitic. France on the other hand is a huge country, and if it wasn't for them America wouldnt exist. Even so, I wouldn't want google controlled by the french either. To be honest I dont want google to even be controlled by google. I think it's time to split up that monopoly, too many americans reply on them for information and news to be even be slightly swayed by a foreign government.

    • (Score: 2) by meustrus on Wednesday November 27 2019, @12:37AM

      by meustrus (4961) on Wednesday November 27 2019, @12:37AM (#925177)

      How is Israel an ally?

      Because that's what the American government considers them to be. I'm not an expert on the specifics. I also didn't call them a friend, I called them an ally. That's primarily a military relationship, and it's expected for allies to influence each other to remain allies.

      I have yet to see a discussion on what Israel is doing to the indigenous Palestinians where it isn't deflected or called antisemitic.

      That's fair, and I share your concern for the Palestinians. Considering the historical precedent of anti-semitism and violence still being perpetrated against innocent Jews based on similar rhetoric, however, it's reasonable for any criticism of Israel to be subjected to intense scrutiny. 99% of the time, pro-Palestinian rhetoric in the US intersects with anti-semitic rhetoric. It's impossible to say whether that is intentional, but regardless, it's dangerous because anti-semitic rhetoric inspires murder of innocent, law-abiding, relatively powerless Jews. Even when the rhetoric is primarily targeting the elites of the state of Israel.

      To be honest I dont want google to even be controlled by google.

      Then why place the blame on some foreign power for Google being evil? That's what JMH did, and that's what you're defending right now. I don't want Google to be controlled by Google either. Blaming Israel also implies that Google would not be evil if it weren't for its foreign influencers.

      And that's what this is really about. The Nazi Party shifted all blame for Germany's failing economy onto Jews and other people they classified as foreign or otherwise undesirable. Fascists attach evil to unchangeable identity groups because it distracts people from making real change.

      In order to really fix the problems with society, including Google and other groups with huge and unaccountable authority, we need to turn away from rhetoric that blames these problems on unchangeable identity groups. Otherwise, the number of people classified as undesirable will continue to grow until only the powerful, like Google, remain.

      First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—
                Because I was not a socialist.

      Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—
                Because I was not a trade unionist.

      Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
                Because I was not a Jew.

      Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

      -- Martin Niemöller, as quoted at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

      --
      If there isn't at least one reference or primary source, it's not +1 Informative. Maybe the underused +1 Interesting?