Facebook Allows Exclusion by Race in Advertising Platform; Takes a Swipe at Snapchat with Latest Main App Test

While it's been established that Facebook is a mammoth advertising tool, the social media network is getting some serious legal flak for the discriminatory nature of its platform for advertisers. Facebook's ethnic affinity feature now allows advertisers to display ads only for people of a certain race. Apart from this, they also took a swipe at Snapchat's signature features by testing them out on the main Facebook app.

Technology website Ars Technica created a test ad on housing using this controversial tool. Their ad succeeded in excluding Facebook users with an ethnic affinity that's Hispanic, Asian-American, or African-American. Their interview with human rights lawyer John Reiman reveals that this feature is illegal and goes against the Fair Housing Act.

While all this is going on in the advertising sphere, Facebook's main app also amplified their messaging and camera functionalities with Snapchat-like features. The highly successful breakthrough video chat app Snapchat introduced the signature digital masks, scene reanimations, and concept of disappearing images or videos. The tested features on Facebook have not rolled out globally and were only tested in Ireland, but they allowed Halloween themes digital masking on Facebook Live and Halloween emojis on Facebook reactions this month.

Facebook's influence straddles a lot of industries, including the nuances of U.S. politics. They recently influenced millions of young people to register as voters for the upcoming Nov. 8 election. Aside from this, Facebook is also going to use its sphere of digital influence to help people get ready for the election by showing a sample ballot and outlining the platforms of the presidential candidates.

Facebook owner Mark Zuckerberg personally acknowledges the influence of his social media network to the world. He habitually posts on his Facebook page about his advocacies and how he is using Facebook to make some change to the world. Recently, he publicly greeted fellow tech mogul Bill Gates on his 61^st birthday and expressed his excitement to "many more years of changing the world."