Meta approved anti-Muslim political ads during polls, claims report

New Delhi, NT Bureau: American social media conglomerate Meta approved 14 advertisements allegedly containing disinformation and inflammatory content amid India’s parliamentary election, The Guardian reported on Monday, citing an investigation by two civil society organisations.

Among the advertisements that were reportedly approved were those that called for 'burning Muslims' and 'executing a key Opposition leader'.

The investigation was carried out by Ek?, a corporate accountability organisation and India Civil Watch International.

The two organisations, to test Meta’s mechanisms to block inflammatory content during India’s Lok Sabha election, created and submitted 22 advertisements to Meta’s ad library, the database of all advertisements on social media platforms Facebook and Instagram.

They claimed that all the advertisements, created through artificial intelligence, violated Meta’s policies on hate speech and misinformation.

Out of 22 ads submitted in English, Hindi, Bengali, Gujarati and Kannada, 14 were approved by Meta, while a further three were reportedly approved after minor tweaks that however did not alter the overall provocative messaging.

Only five ads were rejected for violating Meta’s community standards on hate speech and violence. The ads, which allegedly largely targeted Muslims, were immediately removed after approval by ICWI and Eko.

The advertisements reportedly targeted Muslims with inflammatory references such as “let’s burn this vermin” and “Hindu blood is spilling, these invaders must be burned”, according to The Guardian.

They reportedly used Hindu supremacist language and contained disinformation about political leaders. One of the approved advertisements also contained messaging mimicking that of a doctored video of Union home minister Amit Shah claiming to remove reservations for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes.

In this election, the BJP has been accused of using anti-Muslim rhetoric and stoking fears of attacks on Hindus, who make up 80% of the population, to garner votes. During a rally in Rajasthan, Modi referred to Muslims as “infiltrators” who “have more children”, though he later denied this was directed at Muslims and said he had “many Muslim friends”.

The investigators noted that Meta’s systems did not block incendiary advertisements created using artificial intelligence, even though the social media conglomerate has said it would prevent content manipulated through artificial intelligence from spreading during the Indian election.

Commenting on the findings of the report, Maen Hammad, a campaigner at Ek? told The Guardian: “Supremacists, racists and autocrats know they can use hyper-targeted ads to spread vile hate speech, share images of mosques burning and push violent conspiracy theories – and Meta will gladly take their money, no questions asked.”

A spokesperson for Meta said that those who want to run political advertisements “must go through the authorisation process required on our platforms and are responsible for complying with all applicable laws”.

The spokesperson further told The Guardian: “When we find content, including ads, that violates our community standards or community guidelines, we remove it, regardless of its creation mechanism.”