According to the study by researchers at the University of Southern California, Facebook targeted an Instacart delivery job ad to a large audience of women and a Domino’s Pizza delivery job ad to an audience with a lot of masculine intensity.
Facebook users may not be reporting jobs for which they are qualified because the company’s tools may disproportionately target ads to a specific genre “beyond what can be legally justified,” researchers said. from the university in a study published Friday.
According to the study, in one of three examples that yielded similar results, Facebook targeted an Instacart delivery job ad to an audience with a large number of women and a Domino’s Pizza delivery job ad to a large audience. people.
Instacart has mostly female drivers, and Domino, mostly male, according to the study by researchers at the University of Southern California.
In contrast, Microsoft Corp. LinkedIn displayed delivery job ads on Domino’s at approximately the same proportion of women as Instacart advertising.
“Posting Facebook ads can result in an inclination to post job ads by gender beyond what can be legally justified with possible differences in qualifications,” the study said. The finding reinforces the argument that Facebook’s algorithms may violate U.S. anti-discrimination laws, he added.
Facebook spokesman Joe Osborne said the company explains “a lot of signals to try to post ads to people who will be more interested, but we understand the concerns raised in the report.”
Amid lawsuits and regulatory investigations into discrimination through ad segmentation, Facebook has tightened controls to prevent customers from excluding some groups that see job, housing and other ads.
But researchers remain concerned about the bias of artificial intelligence (AI) software that chooses which users see an advertisement. Facebook and LinkedIn said they are studying their AI for what the tech industry calls “equity.”
LinkedIn Vice President of Engineering Ashvin Kannan said the results of the study “fit our own internal review of our job posting ecosystem.”