Google backs US ban on foreign election ads
Google has called for the US to ban foreign governments from posting election adverts after a backlash over Russian “fake news”. The internet giant told the American election watchdog that a current ban on proxies for foreign governments handing out election material should be extended to include online posts. It comes after Google and Facebook admitted that Russians paid tens of thousands of dollars to run political adverts online before last year’s American presidential election.
GOOGLE has called for the US to ban foreign governments from posting election adverts after a backlash over Russian “fake news”.
The internet giant told the US election watchdog that a current ban on proxies for foreign governments handing out election material should be extended to include online posts.
It comes after Google and Facebook admitted that Russians paid tens of thousands of dollars to run adverts online before last year’s US election. The ban would only apply in America but could be picked up by other governments including Britain amid fears it too has been targeted.
It is unclear exactly how the ban would work, but it is hoped the change will discourage internet companies from hosting such adverts. The intervention comes amid growing fears that the Russian government spread “fake news” aimed at misleading voters before recent elections in America and Europe. Theresa May used a speech this week to call out Russia for planting “fake stories and photo-shopped images” to undermine the West, saying: “We know what you are doing.”
In a separate development, Russia’s parliament passed legislation to declare international media “foreign agents” in response to US scrutiny of the Kremlin’s RT channel.
The move would allow the justice ministry to apply the label, which can also refer to spies, to media that receive funding from states, companies or individuals abroad. US politicians investigating Russian involvement in last year’s election, won by Donald Trump, have grown concerned by the misleading information which circulated on social media before the vote.
Both Facebook and Google, which owns video-sharing site Youtube and message service Gmail, ran political adverts paid for by Russians ahead of the election.
In a written submission to the Federal Election Commission, the independent US elections regulator, Google said such adverts should be banned.
The company proposed strengthening a current ban on foreigners paying for or distributing election material by including online posts in its definition. It also suggested the ban should include campaigning not just for individual candidates but for wider issues. Russian-linked accounts spread messages on topics like immigration and police brutality before the election.
“This would ensure the Foreign National Ban clearly prohibits paid communications over the internet that would already be illegal if distributed by means of broadcast, cable, or satellite,” the Google submission read.
In Russia, media groups with funding from people or governments abroad will have to brand themselves “foreign agents” in all online and offline publications under new legal changes. They will also have to regularly submit their financial information to the state.
Those companies that do not comply could be fined, imprisoned and eventually shut down. The legislation is expected to be signed by Vladimir Putin.