Facebook Is Counting On Postcards To Prevent Future Election Interference
- 2018-03-06
- National Public Radio
After months of intense scrutiny over the role the company played in the 2016 presidential election, the social network giant announced it wants to use postcards to verify the identity of advertising buyers to prevent future foreign meddling.
In advance of November's midterm elections, anyone interested in buying political ads for a specific candidate will receive a physical piece of correspondence along with a special code to confirm that they really do live in the U.S.
"If you run an ad mentioning a candidate, we are going to mail you a postcard and you will have to use that code to prove you are in the United States," Katie Harbath, Facebook's director of global politics and government outreach, said at a weekend conference of the National Association of Secretaries of State.
Only after entering that code into Facebook can a person or organization purchase an ad.