Representatives from Facebook informed it congress that they were selling inadvertently advertising space to Russian agents seeking to influence the US presidential election of 2016. The social network, after research, managed to detect that it received 100.000 dollars coming from fake Russian accounts.
Alex Stamos, Facebook Security Officer, has published an official statement detailing the search process:
"When we looked at our ads, we found about $ 100.000 in ad spending from June 2015 to May 2017 - related to about 3.000 ads - linked to about 470 non-existent accounts and pages that violate our policies. Our analysis indicates that these accounts and Pages were linked to each other and probably operated by Russia. "
While some of the ads clearly supported him Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton, the statement states that the majority of ads focused on controversial voter issues such as arms control, abortion and LGBTQ rights (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender).
According to Alex Stamos, the purpose of these accounts when buying ads was to strengthen divisive messages.
Congressional investigators and special adviser Robert Mueller are currently examining Russian election interventions, and Facebook's representatives are working with the authorities to uncover the depths of the Kremlin's involvement.
According to Alex Stamos:
"We have shared our findings with the US authorities who are investigating these matters and will continue to work with them as necessary."
