Facebook blocks ad transparency tools

You might think an organization accused of running a platform that nurtures misleading and inflammatory content would want third-party watchdogs to help it improve. You'd be wrong.

From ProPublica:

For the past year and a half, ProPublica has been building a searchable database of political ads and the segments of the population advertisers are paying to reach. We did this by enlisting thousands of volunteers who installed a web browser extension. The tool shared the ads users see as well as Facebook’s details on why the users were targeted.

And then Facebook quietly fixed some issues with their platform to "enforce its terms of service." Mysteriously, the tools from ProPublica's and others stopped working shortly thereafter.