Facebook steps up ad review amid Russia probe

Facebook announced on Monday it would hire 1,000 additional employees over the next year as part of its effort to stifle harmful advertisements—particularly from foreign countries attempting to influence U.S. elections. Investigators have been scouring the internet in recent months as part of multiple probes into alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Facebook flagged more than 3,000 problematic ads by Russian entities that ran between 2015 and 2017. “Today we are delivering those ads to congressional investigators and explaining more about the steps we’re taking to strengthen our ads policies and enforcement,” Joel Kaplan, Facebook’s vice president for global policy, said in a statement, adding that all of the 3,000 ads violated Facebook’s terms and conditions and the company would continue to update and improve ad review and enforcement to prevent propaganda from spreading on its online social media service.