Facebook apps helped 4.4 million people register to vote for the 2020 US presidential elections, according to the company’s announcement on Monday.
Facebook announced in June that its Facebook apps, like Messenger and Instagram, aim to help 4 million people register to vote in the upcoming election.
According to the company’s estimates, it helped 2 million people register in 2016 and 2018.
The increase in the numbers suggests that social media companies are reaching more potential voters. Earlier in the year, Facebook launched a voting information center to present resources about voting, such as how to register and how to vote.
According to the information center, the election results would not be accessible for days or weeks after Nov. 3. due to the coronavirus pandemic and an increased number of people voting by mail. There is also a message pinned at the top of users’ feeds with details about the election, such as voting deadlines.
Snapchat, another popular app among young users, posted an increase in users registering through the platform in 2020. The company has guided more than 1 million people register to vote this year, almost thrice the number of voters it recorded in the 2018 midterms.
Banning political ads
Earlier this month, the social media giant has announced new types of political ads related to the 2020 US election that are banned from the platform.
The tech firm’s decision follows concerns raised regarding claims that postal voting could encourage fraud. Facebook has also taken down ads sponsored by US President Donald Trump and his supporters, which claim that accepting refugees would increase COVID-19 infection risk.
The said ads depicted Trump’s Democratic opponent Joe Biden talking about the US border and asylum seekers. Before these posts were removed, hundreds of thousands of people have seen over 38 versions of the ads.
The coronavirus pandemic is expected to force more voters to cast their ballot by post in the upcoming election.
Rob Leathern, director of product management at Facebook, tweeted: “As we get closer to Election Day we want to provide further clarity on policies we recently announced. Last week we said we’d prohibit ads that make premature declarations of victory. We also won’t allow ads with content that seeks to delegitimize the outcome of an election”
“For example, this would include calling a method of voting inherently fraudulent or corrupt, or using isolated incidents of voter fraud to delegitimize the result of an election,” Leathern explained.
He mentioned: “These changes apply to ads across Facebook and Instagram, and are effective immediately.”
Additionally, Facebook banned ads that praise, support, or represent militarized social movements. Ads about QAnon, a conspiracy theory suggesting President Trump is secretly battling Satan-worshipping pedophiles in government, business, and the media, are also prohibited.
However, Facebook’s vice-president of global affairs, Nick Clegg shot down calls to ban all political ads in the run-up to the vote.
Clegg argued: “We block far more political ads than people appreciate. In the second quarter of this year, we blocked around 750,000 political ads from running on our platform which didn’t meet our requirements.”
“It’s a long and familiar feature of American democracy that ads are run with great intensity,” he added, calling it “the lifeblood of democracy”.
