Facebook takes down 11,000 political ads by Helo, owned by same Chinese company as TikTok
New Delhi: Social media giant Facebook has taken down 11,000 advertisements posted by a Chinese app named Helo, due to their political content. Helo is owned by ByteDance, the same company that owns the controversial video-sharing app TikTok.
Facebook removed these ads because they referred to political figures, politics, and nationally-important issues, but did not contain a disclaimer on who paid for the ad, in line with its efforts to increase the transparency of political ad spend on its platform.
This is among the highest number of ads by a single app that Facebook has taken down. According to its Ad Library, it has also removed 49 ads by Vigo Video, also owned by ByteDance, and seven ads posted by ShareChat, a direct competitor of Helo.
The ad spend on these 11,000 ads was approximately Rs 7.7 crore, as per data available in the Facebook Ad Library. ThePrint asked Helo to confirm the accuracy of this estimate, but it said on email: “As we are a private company, we do not comment or share investment details.”
The move comes at a time when the Election Commission has raised concerns about political ads on social media platforms, which could end up influencing voters. Last month, ThePrinthad reported that the EC had written to the union law ministry, seeking a check on Facebook and Twitter ads ahead of the Lok Sabha elections.
Helo’s chequered track record
Helo features content like jokes, shayari, information on sports, entertainment and current affairs in 14 Indian languages.
Its ad content does not promote any particular political party, but promotes the use of Helo by showing “news” about politicians, politics and national issues. Some of its ad captions read “BJP using Atalji to the maximum potential”, “Result day tomorrow no doubt bjp return again mp election result (sic)”, “What utter ridiculousness on display by aaptards…”, or “…Rahul Gandhi said we will abolish GST, now the Congress ruled states are in disagreement to even reduce the slabs”.
The descriptions and images are peppered with sensationalism — such as politicians’ faces photoshopped on to images of an adult pushing a baby in a tricycle, and nonsensical strings of letters.
Fake news problem
In addition to questionable ad content, Helo also has an ongoing fake news content problem.
A November 2018 Hindustan Times report highlighted a range of fake news available on Helo, such as BBC purportedly calling the Congress the “fourth most corrupt party in the world” and Congress leader Sachin Pilot allegedly saying “India should have helped Pakistan clear its debt rather than invest in the Statue of Unity”.
To counter misinformation, Helo partnered with the fact-checking service AltNews in December 2018. However, there is still fake news and misleading information available on Helo platform.
For example, on 27 March, ThePrint was able to find a post on Helo linking to an article comparing the price of the meals Narendra Modi and Rahul Gandhi consume. According to the article, Modi eats breakfast at 7 am and eats dhokla, thepla or poha, with his meals costing about Rs 50 or 60. Gandhi, it claimed, wakes up at 6 am, exercises for two hours and then eats/drinks coffee and omelettes, or even kaju shakes and seasonal fruits, which cost about Rs 200. No sources are provided for this information.
‘Won’t publish political ads in poll period’
Helo told ThePrint it will not publish ads that may be construed as political, in keeping with the EC’s goal to ensure a fair election process.
“We have informed ECI that we will not serve any political advertisements on our platform throughout this election period,” Helo said in its email.
Helo has stopped publishing politics-related ads on Facebook on 20 February 2019.
courtesy: theprint.in
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Two injuries, one DNF, a DQ as India end messy World Relays campaign
Gaborone (Botswana) (PTI): Amoj Jacob and Ragul Kumar got injured during the men's 4x400m and 4x100 races respectively as India ended their World Athletics Relays campaign in disappointment on the second day of competitions here on Sunday.
The Indian camp had high hopes of making the 2027 World Championships in the men's 4x400m relay but the team did not finish (DNF) the race as Jacob suffered cramps and pulled out of the race after taking the baton from the first leg runner Dharamveer Choudhary. Rajesh Ramesh and Vishal TK were to run in the third and fourth legs.
Those teams which could not qualify for the 2027 Beijing World Championships by reaching the final round of each of the six relay events on Saturday were given another chance in the second qualification round on Sunday.
The top two teams in each of the two heats (in all six relay events) booked the Beijing ticket on Sunday.
India will now have to try and qualify for the World Championships through the Top Lists of the World Athletics, which is a long and tedious process.
In the men's 4x100m race, third leg runner Ragul Kumar fell down the track after failing to hand over the baton inside the exchange zone to fourth leg runner Gurindervir Singh, which clearly showed the lack of coordination among the runners.
Harsh Santosh Raut and Animesh Kujur ran the first two legs.
The Indian quartet was disqualified and Kumar was seen being taken away from the Field of Play with the help of the volunteers.
It was a comedy of errors in the case of the women's 4x100m race, which saw the baton being dropped during an exchange between first leg runner Tamanna and second runner Nithya Gandhe, though the Indians finished the race in 53.09 seconds.
Gandhe started running quite a distance, but after realising that the baton was not in her hand, she turned and ran back to pick it up.
The only silver-lining for the Indian contingent was the national record time in the mixed 4x100m relay race, though the quartet of Ragul Kumar, Nithya Gandhe, Animesh Kujur and Sneha SS finished sixth in heat number two with a time of 41.35 seconds, bettering the previous national mark of 42.30 seconds set in March in Chandigarh.
The mixed 4x400m relay quartet of Theerthesh P Shetty, Kumari Saloni, Nihal William and Rashdeep Kaur ended at fifth in heat number one with a time of 3 minutes and 19.40 seconds.
On Saturday, all the five Indian relay teams had failed to make it to the respective final rounds and thus missed out on the 2027 World Championships berths.
