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Google will require political ads 'prominently disclose' their AI-generated aspects
Google will begin enforcing a rule that requires advertisers clearly label their AI-altered political ads ahead of a contentious 2024 presidential election season.
The Republican National Committee is suing Google over Gmail's spam filters
The Republican National Committee has accused Google of sending “millions” of campaign emails to Gmail spam folders.
FEC says Google can let political campaigns dodge Gmail's spam filters
The DNC says a pilot project could subject users to 'abusive fundraising tactics.'
FEC rules that campaigns can get discounts on cybersecurity
Political campaigns will need cybersecurity to avoid a repeat of the 2016 presidential election, but are often strapped for cash. The Federal Election Commission made a ruling today that will make it legal for campaigns to secure low-cost services from cybersecurity firms, as long as the firms offer the same rates to their non-political clients. According to the New York Times, FEC lawyers initially had concerns that the practice would violate campaign finance laws designed to prevent corporations from currying favor with political candidates.
House Judiciary Committee hearing on social media called a 'hoax'
A few weeks after Mark Zuckerberg appeared in front of Congress, House Representatives once again discussed social media, however, this time the guests were a little different. House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) convened a hearing on "Filtering Practices of Social Media Platforms," without the attendance of any executives from Facebook, Twitter or Google in an event that ranking member Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) said "prioritized a hoax." Alongside David Chavern of the News Media Alliance and American Press Institute, Berin Szoka of TechFreedom and New York Law School professor Ari Waldman were self-titled social media stars Diamond and Silk.
Cambridge Analytica accused of violating US election laws
Cambridge Analytica's Facebook data harvesting hasn't just prompted lawsuits over the privacy violations -- it's now sparking a legal battle over its role in US elections. ABC News has learned that watchdog group Common Cause has filed complaints with the Federal Election Commission and Justice Department alleging that Cambridge Analytica broke federal election laws barring foreigners from participating in the strategies of US political campaigns. According to Common Cause, the UK firm ignored warnings to avoid involvement in American political committees and provided its Facebook user data to help target campaign efforts that included the presidential runs of Donald Trump and Ted Cruz as well as a John Bolton super PAC.
Google and ProPublica help journalists cover local elections
ProPublica and Google's News Lab are teaming up to help journalists, especially at the local level, report on all things related to elections. The Election Databot, which launched during the 2016 general election, will now offer up data on every race from the Alabama senate race through to the 2018 midterms. The portal for each event will broadcast a firehose of relevant news stories, search trends for the candidates and even broadcast FEC spending data.
Senators want FEC to improve transparency for online political ads
It's not just companies like Google asking the Federal Election Commission to improve disclosure for online political ads. A group of 15 Democrat senators (led by Sens. Claire McCaskill, Amy Klobuchar and Mark Warner) has filed an official comment calling on the FEC to take "immediate action" increasing the transparency for internet political ads. Russia took advantage of exemptions in political ad law to influence the 2016 presidential election without revealing its involvement, the senators argued, and that could be "the norm" if the Commission doesn't step in. Internet ads should be scrutinized just as closely as their TV and radio counterparts, according to the senators.
Google urges FEC to adopt more specific rules for political ads
Google, Facebook and Twitter have all found evidence of Russian influence for last year's US presidential election. Google, however, is seeking to separate itself a bit from it's social-media peers in a new document filed with the US Federal Election Commission (FEC) on Thursday, according to a report by Recode. We have since received a copy of the filing from Google and have verified the details.
Democrats call for tougher online ad spending rules
Politicians aren't just asking Facebook to testify on how suspicious Russia-linked ads allegedly reached its social network -- they want some political reform to prevent this from happening again. A mix of House and Senate Democrats have written a letter to the Federal Election Commission calling for it to produce "new guidance" telling online advertising platforms (like those at Facebook and Google) how to prevent illegal foreign spending during elections. Internet ad buys give countries like Russia a cheap but effective method for "disruption of our democratic process," the politicians say, and it's important that internet companies stop this to "preserve the integrity" of election law.
