Meta’s help center updated its policy to state that it does not allow political advertisers to use its new AI ad campaign creation tools. A Meta spokesperson, in an exclusive report to Reuters, stated that the company does not permit political campaigns and advertisers to use its new AI ad creation tools.
Meta recently decided not to make its new AI ad creation tools available to political campaigns and advertisers. According to Meta’s help center on Nov. 6, the tools are still undergoing testing in its Ads Manager,
“Advertisers running campaigns that qualify as ads for Housing, Employment or Credit or Social Issues, Elections, or Politics, or related to Health, Pharmaceuticals or Financial Services aren’t currently permitted to use these Generative AI features.”
“We believe this approach will allow us to better understand potential risks and build the right safeguards for the use of Generative AI in ads that relate to potentially sensitive topics in regulated industries.”
While Meta has general advertising standards, there is no specific policy on AI ads. However, Meta does prohibit ads that fact-checking partners have debunked. Google updated its political content policy in September, requiring all verified election advertisers to disclose whether they used AI in their campaign content.
Google’s standards call out “synthetic content that inauthentically depicts real or realistic-looking people or events” and states that the notices must be “clear and conspicuous” in places where users will notice them.
However, on Google’s platforms, “Ads that contain synthetic content altered or generated in such a way that is inconsequential to the claims made in the ad will be exempt from these disclosure requirements.”
US regulators are exploring potential regulations around political AI deep fakes in the lead-up to the 2024 election cycle. However, concerns about the impact of AI usage on social media platforms influencing voter sentiment by creating fake news, deepfakes, and other manipulated content exist. The widespread accessibility of AI tools has made fake content creation more accessible to the public.
Claims have surfaced that ChatGPT, a popular AI chatbot, exhibits a political bias leaning toward the left according to a Washington Post publication. However, experts in the AI community and academia have questioned these claims.
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