Thread by @propublica

NEW: In 2016, we tested Facebook’s advertising tools to prove that it allowed users to exclude people from seeing housing ads by race, gender, age and more.

These are protected by civil rights law.

Today a suit calls out housing companies that allegedly discriminate by age👇

2/ The new lawsuit accuses seven housing companies of using Facebook’s targeted advertising system to discriminate against older people looking for a place to live.
washingtonpost.com/technology/201…

The companies did not comment to @washingtonpost.

@washingtonpost 3/ Today’s suit is the first to accuse specific housing companies of discrimination. If it succeeds, experts say it could open the door to other anti-discrimination actions against advertisers, even if they’re using another company’s ad-targeting tools.

4/ Back in 2016, we tested FB’s ad portal to see how exactly advertisers could target ads without users’ knowledge. We found that you could exclude people by race, gender, age, national origin and other categories protected by civil rights law. propub.li/34XGpYb

5/ With the help of our readers, we later found examples of employers doing just that in job ads…

...excluding by age: propub.li/306GtFW

...and excluding by gender: propub.li/32TAVf9

6/ Facebook promised to fix the problem back in 2016. Then, when they didn’t, we called them out on it in 2017.

propub.li/2Au173J

7/ Finally, in March, after lawsuits by fair housing organizations and civil rights groups, Facebook promised to make sweeping changes to its system. propub.li/2O4dCLo

8/ HUD and the State of New York have also accused Facebook of violating the Fair Housing Act, claiming that the company’s ad system discriminates against certain types of users even when advertisers did not choose to exclude them from seeing ads. propub.li/30cgrjO

9/ Don’t miss out on our investigations 👉 propub.li/2SIJu8c