Facebook will no longer allow advertisers to deploy race-based ad targeting on certain ads.
“We will disable the use of ethnic affinity marketing for ads that we identify as offering housing, employment or credit,” said Facebook’s VP of US Public Policy and Chief Privacy Officer Erin Egan in a statement.
She added: “We take these issues seriously. Discriminatory advertising has no place on Facebook.”
Earlier this month, members of the Congressional Black Caucus sent a letter to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg warning him that the company might be breaking federal law with its practice of letting advertisers exclude certain racial groups from seeing their ads.
In addition, a lawsuit was filed in California federal court earlier this month alleging that Facebook’s ad targeting tools violate federal fair housing and civil rights laws.
The company will meet with policymakers and civil rights leaders in an effort to improve enforcement of its anti-discrimination policies, according to the statement.
“We are making these changes to deter discrimination and strengthen our ability to enforce our policies,” Egan said. “We look forward to finding additional ways to combat discrimination, while increasing opportunity, and to continuing our dialogue with policymakers and civil rights leaders about these important issues.”
