Google takes new measures to increase transparency on political ads
San Francisco, Aug 16 :Google took a new move Wednesday to increase transparency on political ads on its platform by releasing an online library of US political ads and a report on details of ad-expenditure ahead of the mid-term US elections in November this year.
Google said the addition of the political advertising report and the new Ad Library are new transparency features aimed at implementing new requirements for any advertiser purchasing election ads on Google in the US, Xinhua reported.
Under the new mechanism, political advertisers now have to provide a government-issued ID and other key information that confirms they are a US citizen or lawful permanent resident in the country.
The measures are apparently an updated response to disputes on social media networks that Russia had been involved in U.S. presidential elections in 2016, an allegation that has been rejected repeatedly by Moscow.
Google is running a searchable archive Wednesday where people can find all data and details about political ads via its Search engine and YouTube, including promotions for a candidate for a federal elected office or a sitting official.
The library allows users to search who pays for the ads, the costs in deploying the advertising and how long the ads will be running, plus the number of page views.
The US tech giant has agreed to give the public and third parties direct access to the archive through Google Cloud's BigQuery, where anyone can write code and run their own unique queries on this data set.
"Researchers, political watchdog groups and private citizens can use our data set to develop charts, graphs, tables or other visualizations of political advertising on Google Ads services," said Michee Smith, the product lead on the company's transparency report.
"With the Transparency Report, we hope this provides unprecedented, data-driven insights into election ads on our platform," Google said.
With the the 2018 midterm elections approaching, Google said its new tools aim to help protect political campaigns, provide voters with accurate information, and increase transparency across its platforms.
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2 LPG tankers sail through Strait of Hormuz, 16 still stranded
New Delhi (PTI): Two more Indian-flagged LPG tankers have safely crossed the war-hit Strait of Hormuz and are headed for Indian ports even as 16 other vessels remain stranded in the Persian Gulf, officials said Monday.
LPG vessel Green Sanvi carrying 46,650 tonnes of LPG is scheduled to reach Indian port on April 7 while Green Asha with 15,500 tonnes of cargo is scheduled to touch Indian coast on April 9, said Mukesh Mangal, Additional Secretary in Ministry of Ports, Shipping & Waterways at a news briefing.
"Indian maritime operations remain safe and uninterrupted amid West Asia crisis. 16 Indian-flagged vessels with 433 seafarers are in the region; two LPG carriers, Green Sanvi and Green Asha, safely crossed Strait of Hormuz," he said.
With this, eight Indian-flagged LPG tankers have safely transited through the strategic waterway, which has remained effectively shut since the US and Israel launched attacks on Iran on February 28 and Tehran's sweeping retaliation.
Of the vessels still stuck in the Persian Gulf, one is of a loaded liquefied natural gas (LNG), two are LPG tankers (one loaded and one empty), six are crude carriers (five loaded, one empty), three are container ships, one is a dredger, one is carrying chemical cargo and two are bulk carriers, he said.
Asked about reports of Iran charging a fee for letting ships cross the strait, Mangal said, "we have no information of such payments."
For a country that relies on imports from Gulf nations to meet as much as 60 per cent of its cooking gas needs, the arrivals will help ease the worst LPG shortage it is battling in decades. India consumed 33.15 million tonne of LPG last year, with imports accounting for about 60 per cent of demand. As much as 90 per cent of those imports came from West Asia.
The US-Israel attacks on Iran, and Tehran's sweeping retaliation have all but halted shipping through the strait - the narrow shipping lane that is the conduit for oil and gas exports from Gulf countries to the world. Iran has, however, stated that "non-hostile vessels" may transit the waterway after coordinating with Iranian authorities.
Last week, two LPG carriers, BW TYR and BW ELM, carrying combined LPG cargo of about 94,000 tonnes safely transited the region. While BW TYR reached Mumbai on March 31, BW ELM docked at New Mangalore on April 1.
Prior to that, four Indian-flagged LPG tankers had safely sailed through the strait. Pine Gas and Jag Vasant, carrying 92,612 tonnes of LPG, reached Indian ports between March 26 and March 28. MT Shivalik and MT Nanda Devi, carrying about 92,712 tonnes of LPG, had reached Mundra port in Gujarat on March 16 and Kandla port in the state on March 17.
Originally, there were 28 Indian-flagged vessels in the Strait of Hormuz when the war in West Asia broke. Of these, 24 were on the West side of the strait and four on the East side. Eight vessels from the west side and two from east have managed to sail to safety.
Besides the eight LPG tankers, the Indian-flagged oil tanker Jag Laadki, with 80,886 tonnes of crude oil from the UAE, reached Mundra on March 18.
Another tanker, Jag Prakash, carrying gasoline from Oman to Africa, had previously safely crossed the strait and is en route to Tanzania.
