Despite Facebook’s stated intention to make their political database more
transparent, there remains a gap in existing regulatory guidelines. Because of
this confusion, the FEC in 2018 opened a rule-making process on this issue.13
The agency held hearings in June 2018 to consider two proposed sets of
regulations for online ad disclaimers. The ﬁrst set of regulations, dubbed
Proposal A, would treat all but a subset of paid political ads online as in the
same category of radio, television, and print ads, ones that need the full set of
clearly legible or audible disclaimers. The one exemption would be for a small
category of text or graphic online ads where a disclaimer would take up too
much space to be practical. It would allow in this case for an abbreviated
disclaimer and/or a “linking” option to full disclaimers (similar to the one
authorized in Google’s advisory opinion request in 2010).
Social_Media_and_Democracy