Today, we are launching the next iteration of the “Why am I seeing this ad?” tool, which we created nearly a decade ago to give people information about why they see certain ads across our technologies. Since its initial launch, we’ve made improvements to “Why am I seeing this ad?” to make it easier to use and understand. Today’s update takes it one step further and now includes information about how we use machine learning models to show people ads.

What’s New

Beginning today, the “Why am I seeing this ad?” tool on Facebook will include: 

• Information summarized into topics about how your activity both on and off our technologies — such as liking a post on a friend’s Facebook page or interacting with your favorite sports website — may inform the machine learning models we use to shape and deliver the ads you see. 
• New examples and illustrations explaining how our machine learning models connect various topics to show you relevant ads.  
• More ways to find our ads controls. You will now be able to access Ads Preferences from additional pages in the “Why am I seeing this ad?” tool. 

Why We Built This

We worked closely with external privacy experts and policy stakeholders from around the world to get input on what transparency changes they want to see in our ads system. A consistent answer was that we should increase our transparency around how our machine learning models contribute to the ads people see on our services.

We are committed to using machine learning models responsibly. Being transparent about how we use machine learning is essential because it ensures that people are aware that this technology is a part of our ads system and that they know the types of information it is using. By stepping up our transparency around how our machine learning models work to deliver ads, we aim to help people feel more secure and increase our accountability. The changes we’re making to “Why am I seeing this ad?” reflect the feedback we’ve received and are designed to provide people with clear information about the machine learning models that help determine the ads they see.

These new features are the latest step in our continuous evolution of “Why am I seeing this ad?” We will continue to improve our ads transparency offerings and search for new ways to provide people with better understanding of how we use data and technology to show them ads.

Where Can I Find “Why am I seeing this ad?”

You can click on the three-dot menu in the upper-right-hand corner of any ad you see in your Facebook Feed and navigate to “Why am I seeing this ad.” If an explanation in the tool is unclear or confusing, we want to hear about it.

You can use the feedback tool at the bottom of “Why am I seeing this ad?” to tell us about your experience and how we can do better. As always, you can still hide all ads from a given advertiser and access your ads preferences from the “Why am I seeing this ad?” interface.

This updated version of “Why am I seeing this ad?” is rolling out globally on Facebook first, and we plan on expanding it to Instagram in the future.