Facebook reported today that 470 “probably” fake accounts operated from Russia spent about $ 100,000 on hiring political ads on this social network in the past two years.
Facebook revealed this data as part of its internal investigation to clarify the role of the ads in this platform within the presumed interference of Russia in the last American elections, in which it defeated the Republican aspirant to the White House and today president, Donald Trump .
In a statement released today, Facebook security chief Alex Stamos revealed that from June 2015 to May 2017 they have located approximately 3,000 ads on Facebook pages that violated their terms of service.
“Our analysis suggests that these accounts and pages were affiliated with each other and probably operated from Russia,” he said.
Stamos clarified that the vast majority of these ads did not specifically refer to the US elections or any of their candidates, but indicated that they did appear to “focus on expanding divisive social and political messages” on racial, immigration, access to fire or questions about the LGBT community (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender).
This Facebook security official also said they shared the details of their findings with US authorities investigating the case.
“We know we have to stay vigilant to anticipate people who are trying to misuse our platform. We believe in protecting the integrity of civic discourse,” Stamos said.
The proliferation of false news and its alleged impact on the outcome of the US elections has led to Facebook, one of the most digital platforms related to this controversial phenomenon, to develop and implement new tools to filter the Internet buloff in recent months.
