Facebook allows users to see all ads on Pages, flag suspicious ones
San Francisco, June 29 : After coming under the scanner for alleged Russian meddling in 2016 US Presidential election through Facebook, the social networking giant has now decided to allow users to see the active ads a Page is running and flag suspicious ones.
"The hope of the announcement today is that it will hold us accountable, it will hold advertisers accountable -- but it will also give people a lot more ability to find things that maybe shouldn't be up. Or find things that might be misleading so that we can take actions," Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg said on Thursday.
"Our ultimate goal is very simple: we want to reduce bad ads, we want to make sure that people understand what they're seeing, who paid for it, and the fullness of what other people might see," Sandberg said while addressing the media at Facebook's Menlo Park headquarters in California.
As part of the new transparency initiatives, Facebook said users will be able to see the ads a Page is running across Facebook, Instagram, Messenger and its partner network, even if those ads are not targeted at them.
The Pages will now have an "Info and Ads" section which will have information about the ads and allow users to flag anything suspicious by clicking on "Report Ad."
"You can also learn more about Pages, even if they don't advertise. For example, you can see any recent name changes and the date the Page was created. We'll be adding more Page information in the coming weeks," Rob Leathern, Facebook's Director of Product Management and the company's Product Marketing Director Emma Rodgers said in a statement.
Facebook said it will also soon launch its political ads labeling and archive in Brazil, ahead of October's general election. Facebook launched this initiative in the US in May.
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Congress cites Maniben Patel's diary entries, asks Rajnath to apologise for Babri claim
New Delhi (PTI): The Congress on Saturday shared diary entries of Vallabhbhai Patel's daughter from a book to rebut Defence Minister Rajnath Singh's claim that India's first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, wanted to build the Babri masjid using public funds, and demanded that Singh apologise for spreading "falsehoods".
Congress general secretary in charge of communications, Jairam Ramesh, claimed the defence minister was spreading falsehoods to “improve his relationship” with Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
“Here is Maniben's original diary entry in Gujarati on pages 212-213 in the book ‘Samarpit Padchhayo Sardarno’ by CA R S Patel 'Aaresh', published by Sardar Patel Vallabhbhai Patel Memorial Society, 2025,” Ramesh said on X, sharing screenshots of the relevant pages from the book.
“There is a huge difference between what is contained in the original diary entry and what Rajnath Singh ji and his fellow ‘distorians’ are propagating,” Ramesh said.
“The Defence Minister must apologise for the falsehoods he is spreading, simply to improve his relationship with the PM,” he claimed.
The Congress had earlier termed Singh's claim that Nehru wanted to build the Babri masjid using public funds a “lie” and “WhatsApp university story”, and said the defence minister should not walk in Prime Minister Narendra Modi's path.
Addressing a gathering at Sadhli village in Gujarat's Vadodara district last Tuesday, Singh said Nehru wanted to build the Babri masjid using public funds, but Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel didn't allow his plans to succeed.
The BJP had cited a book by Vallabhbhai Patel's daughter to double down on Singh's claims, and said the first prime minister also said he felt "repelled" by some of the temples in south India despite their beauty.
“The source of what Rajnath Singh said is the 'Inside Story of Sardar Patel, Diary of Maniben Patel'," BJP Rajya Sabha MP and national spokesperson Sudhanshu Trivedi had said at a press conference at the party headquarters while responding to media queries on the issue.
Trivedi claimed that on Page 24 of the book, it is written that Nehru also raised the question of the Babri mosque, but Sardar Patel made it clear that the government could not spend any money on building a mosque.
