Facebook (NASDAQ: FB) is planning to restrict the amount of micro-targeted ads it hosts on its platform, which are politically tinged ads that target only small groups of people.
The tech behemoth plans to do this by increasing the minimum target size from 100 people to thousands of people, thereby reducing the number of smaller groups that are affected by potential misinformation. Facebook may also take advice from candidates in both the democratic and republican parties respectively.
Talking to members of both parties may be Facebook's way of appeasing both sides, since it usually receives flack from political parties all around for giving more screen time to other stakeholders.
Actor Sacha Baron Cohen openly expressed criticism of social media platforms for political reasons, including Facebook, calling the website part of "the greatest propaganda machine in history" on Thursday along with Twitter, YouTube, Google and others.
The move strategically comes a year before the U.S. 2020 elections, as there are concerns that foreign governments and desperate politicians may employ the use of highly targeted ads to make unfounded claims and sway votes in important regions.
This is what caused the Trump campaign to be so successful in 2016, as the "silo" effect makes political groups retreat into each other.
With the advent of the technological revolution that has perforated every sphere of our lives, the process of fragmentation begins online when people engage in socioeconomic dialogue contained within their own peer groups. Herein lies the ultimate paradox of social media and of society itself: networking sites such as Twitter, which were meant to connect masses of people, eventually transformed into cliquey, polarized platforms that harbored a potpourri of segmented opinions based on different factions.
A Facebook ban wouldn't completely halt this practice, but it might discourage the kind of behavior seen in 2016.
"As we've said, we are looking at different ways we might refine our approach to political ads," a Facebook spokesman said on Thursday.