Page 24 - ARUBA TODAY

A24 TECHNOLOGY
Monday 3 February 2020
Online political ads: cheap, efficient and ripe for misuse

By BARBARA ORTUTAY and ads from its platform world-
AMANDA SEITZ wide.
Associated Press The tech companies have
Older men in Arkansas been left to regulate them-
might see a close-up photo selves, in part, because the
of President Donald Trump FEC has been gridlocked for
pumping his fist in the air, years over rules that would
along with a message ask- be tailored to the booming
ing them to donate $30 to online political ad industry.
his campaign for a Super The agency is without a full
Bowl commercial. set of leaders and does not
Middle-aged women in have a quorum needed to
California might see a pho- consider new rules for ads
to of Trump pointing to a or to penalize campaigns
crowd, with a plea for them for violating the law.
to give "any amount" to the "We end up in kind of the
campaign. messy state we're in when
Before Election Day, politi- your regulators stop regu-
cians across party lines are lating and there's a ton of
expected to spend more money in the system," Karpf
than $1 billion to pelt voters added. "Of course that's
with millions of these cheap going to end up going hay-
online ads, which can be wire."
tailored to a voter's most In this April 26, 2019, file photo, visitors to New York's Times Square use umbrellas to shield Facebook has stuck to its
personal details — down to themselves against the rain as they walk past the Armed Forces Recruitment Center. plan of prohibiting third-
Associated Press
one household or even a party fact checkers from
single individual. nization's tax identifica- law last summer banning opposing candidates who rating political ads as false,
Experts warn that this ad- tion number or other gov- red-light cameras in the might unwittingly be fea- despite widespread criti-
targeting system is still vul- ernment ID. Twitter later state. Wilson argues that tured in an attack ad by cism from politicians such
nerable to manipulation by banned all political ads. microtargeting helps to political rivals. as Democratic presidential
foreign governments and "Microtargeting" allowed mobilize voters around cer- In nearly every type of race candidate Sen. Elizabeth
domestic actors trying to the divisive messages to tain issues. — from city council can- Warren.
influence the election, just reach small pockets of vot- Google and Facebook didates to the presiden- The social network has ac-
as they did in 2016. Those ers in certain geographical have spent years collect- tial election — campaigns knowledged that the tools
attempts could become locations based on their ing troves of data that now might struggle to spot false aren't perfect. Sarah Schiff,
more sophisticated this specific interests. help campaigns persuade claims running about their a Facebook product man-
year as tech companies Google this month began voters, said Luca Cian, a candidate online, said ager, said the goal is to
wrestle with a dysfunctional limiting U.S. advertisers' abil- professor at the Darden Democratic campaign make it "more difficult" for
federal election watchdog ity to target political ads School of Business who fo- consultant Jared Kamrass. bad actors to misuse the
agency and deploy hap- beyond broad categories cuses on how marketing af- "If a negative ad is run platform.
hazard safeguards that still such as sex, age and postal fects political campaigns. against my candidate on Even smaller platforms, in-
offer plenty of loopholes. code. Facebook will con- "I can specify that one per- digital, I almost have no cluding TikTok and Pinter-
"There's now so much mon- tinue to allow campaigns son in one specific house- way of knowing about it est, have been forced to
ey and attention spent on- to target voters for any rea- hold should see a specific unless someone screen- confront the issue by ban-
line with so few rules that if son, down to their most per- ad," he said. "And their shots it," Kamrass said. ning political ads entirely,
you wanted chaos, that's sonal interests. neighbor could see a dif- But there is a flip side. The as has the Microsoft-owned
the place to go for chaos," Such targeting technology ferent ad." ads are helpful for less- LinkedIn. But none of those
said David Karpf, a political offers distinct advantages. It's not just campaigns run- er-known candidates or rules is foolproof.
communications professor A candidate running a TV ning ads. With the click of a smaller local and statewide Experts say political cam-
at The George Washington spot might reach a specif- button and a few hundred campaigns that can now paigns, foreign govern-
University. "And there's a ic audience watching the dollars, ordinary people or spend as little as $250 to ment and trolls will contin-
bunch of people who want show "The Real Housewives businesses can now pur- reach hundreds or thou- ue to push the boundaries,
chaos." of Atlanta." But on Face- chase political ads that are sands of voters online, he testing to see which mes-
According to Face- book that same candi- directed at specific groups said. sages, images or videos
book, Russia-connected date can run a specific ad of people to see. Since the last presidential resonate with potential vot-
accounts spent about aimed at Atlanta house- The sheer volume of ads election, tech companies ers based on their data.
$100,000 on Facebook ads wives who lean moderate, makes it nearly impossible have considered many "For democracy to work,
during the 2016 presidential like to hunt and hold a mas- to track them. questions: Should they al- you need a common real-
election. The ads seemed ter's degree, for instance. "How does anybody even low political ads at all? ity, which means a com-
to fan division on polarizing In Texas, for example, Re- begin to try and keep up Fact-check them? Cata- mon understanding of
issues such as gun control publican strategist Chris and monitor tens of thou- log them in a public data- who's saying what when,"
and race relations. That's Wilson said his polling found sands ... or maybe millions base? Prevent them from said Daniel G. Newman,
a fraction of the cost of a suburban women were of ads?" asked Ellen Wein- being targeted to small the president of MapLight,
single 30-second spot on a frustrated by red-light cam- traub, chairwoman of the groups of people? a nonprofit that tracks po-
major TV network. eras, so he targeted thou- Federal Election Commis- Some companies adopted litical money, lobbying and
But it was enough to stir sands of them on Face- sion, the taxpayer-funded their own rules for political votes. "But when politicians
up trouble. In response, book with ads promising watchdog agency that ads. Twitter, which made are saying different things
Google, Facebook and that his client GOP Gov. creates and enforces rules little money off the ads, to different audiences,
Twitter instituted verifica- Greg Abbott would abolish for federal campaigns. took the most radical step. even thousands of differ-
tion policies that require the cameras if elected to a That's a problem for jour- In November, CEO Jack ent small audiences, there's
advertisers to confirm their second term in 2018. nalists seeking to hold politi- Dorsey announced the site an inability to hold them
identity using their orga- Abbott won and signed a cians accountable and for would reject all political accountable."q