Facebook has temporarily shut down the "self-advertising targeted fields" in its advertising system following complaints that advertisers could target users interested in such themes as "Jew Hater" and "Hitler did nothing wrong."
The network automatically generates demographic categories that advertisers can choose to target based on information in user profiles.
As a result, the system had accidentally put offensive phrases in the list of hobbies and interests that advertisers may want to choose for their ads.
All in all, the categories included only several thousand users, but their very existence has raised concerns about the efficiency of the social network's hate speech monitoring system.
How was that even an option? Well, #Facebook just lost my advertising dollars. https://t.co/VOREPt9hlz
— Lisa K Berton (@lisano1) 15 сентября 2017 г.
What does it say about America when #Facebook accepts money for advertising targeted at Jew Haters? #Trump is not our only scumbag.
— John Lundin (@johnlundin) 14 сентября 2017 г.
Facebook said it will keep the service shut down until the problem is resolved.
#Facebook has tightened rules on advertising to restrict inappropriate content from being monetised https://t.co/cHbtlsPgoE pic.twitter.com/aU5Bi8ULim
— MRA Marketing (@MRAMarketing) 15 сентября 2017 г.
Later, Harvard's research fellow Joshua Benton wrote on Twitter that internet users can also find similar categories using Google AdWords, but their range is even broader.
Thus, for each category like, for example, "burning Jews", Google suggests several keywords, including "burnt Jews," "did they burn Jews," etc.
And Google is happy to suggest some other search terms I might want to target to broaden my anti-Semitic reach pic.twitter.com/qZrT4UKigF
— Joshua Benton (@jbenton) 15 сентября 2017 г.
