Facebook is building a tool to fight advertising without consent
The social network plans to require advertisers to certify that users agreed to have their data used for marketing campaigns on the social network.
Advertisers will need to make sure they have someone's permission before sending out targeted messages using Facebook.
Facebook is building a certification tool that will require advertisers confirm they received user permission before using emails to target advertising on the huge social network.
The tool, reported earlier by TechCrunch, will be part of Facebook's Custom Audiences program, which allows advertisers to upload lists of hashed customer data, such as email addresses. Facebook then matches that data against its users, allowing advertisers to target individuals on the social network for advertising.
The new certification tool will require advertisers to pledge they received permission to use the data. Facebook is also expected to prevent sharing of the data across accounts.
"We've always had terms in place to ensure that advertisers have consent for data they use," Elisabeth Diana, a Facebook spokesperson said. "But we're going to make that much more prominent and educate advertisers on the way they can use the data."
The news comes as Facebook weathers the biggest controversy of its 14-year history. Last month, news broke that Cambridge Analytica, a consultancy, had reportedly used data from 50 million user accounts to develop marketing tactics that were later used in the 2016 presidential election. Cambridge Analytica got the data through a researcher, who had harvested it under rules Facebook previously had in place.
Facebook has said that Cambridge Analytica certified three years ago the information had been deleted, as did the researcher. But Facebook later received information that some of the user data hadn't been purged, and The New York Times has reported that at least some of it still exists.
The storm over the data collection, which follows criticism of the social network for serving as ground zero for Russian trolls ahead of the election, has prompted calls for CEO Mark Zuckerberg to testify before lawmakers. Both the US Congress and UK Parliament are clamoring for Zuckerberg testify though he hasn't committed to doing so.
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