Your location, religion, political convictions, even sexual orientation – it’s all information that online platforms like Facebook track about the users and then offer to advertisers. This allows them to create advertisements that are specifically targeting you, using information you never thought they could have.

And when it’s used for political parties, it can threaten our democracy and free and fair elections. By feeding people only information that will interest or even enrage them, they become tracked in echo chambers that prevent them from hearing opposing or alternative viewpoints. This makes people angrier, more polarized, and less informed. And we’ve seen the consequences of this on election day.

Member of the European Parliament Paul Tang of the Netherlands, Karolina Iwanska of the Panoptykon Foundation and Eva Simon from Liberties join the Speechbag podcast to discuss the threats of targeted advertising and what the EU could do about it.

More on online political advertising

Microtargeted Political Ads Should Be Minimized: New Policy Paper