Facebook is to crack down on ads running next to offensive material by launching a new system that will create a blacklist of pages and groups that contain any violent, graphic or sexual content, even if it previously passed its community standards.
The social networking company will apply the new measures from Monday, following mounting pressure from advertisers such as Nissan, Nationwide and BSkyB, which have pulled campaigns over concerns about the content of web pages where they appeared.
Sky’s advert for a voucher promotion for British retailer Marks and Spencer was placed on a Facebook page called “cute and gay boys”, according to BBC News.
Facebook intends to start with a manual review of every potentially controversial page or group to stop ad campaigns appearing on them in the future.
“We will now seek to restrict ads from appearing next to pages and groups that contain any violent, graphic or sexual content (content that does not violate our community standards),” the company said. “Prior to this change, a page selling adult products was eligible to have ads appear on its right-hand side; now there will not be ads displayed next to this type of content.” © Guardian News & Media 2013
