Facebook introduces new Ad Archive API to help prevent abuse on its platform

The API offers ad creative, start and end date, and performance data, including total spend and impressions for ads. It also shows demographics of people reached, including age, gender and location.

Social media giant Facebook has rolled out the Ad Archive API to help prevent abuse on its platform, especially during elections. With this new API researchers and journalists can more easily analyze Facebook ads related to politics or issues of national importance.

The API will be initially launched in the U.S. The increased transparency will increase accountability not just for Facebook but for advertisers, as well.

"Beginning with a group of publishers, academics and researchers in the US, we'll learn what's most useful and how to improve the API before opening it up more broadly. Input from this group will also form the basis of an Archive report that will be available starting in September," said a blog post by Rob Leathern, director of product management at Facebook.

"We're greatly encouraged by trends and insights that watchdog groups, publishers, and academics have unearthed since the archive launched in May. We believe this deeper analysis will increase accountability for both Facebook and advertisers," the post added.

The API offers ad creative, start and end date, and performance data, including total spend and impressions for ads. It also shows the demographics of people reached, including age, gender, and location.

The company is investing heavily in more people and better technology to proactively identify abuse across its platform.