---
title: "Facebook Reportedly Let Marketers Advertise to Nazis"
description: "Once again, Facebook has been caught offering advertisers the ability to specifically market to neo-Nazis and people interested in Nazi music."
date: "2019-02-22"
modified: "2019-02-22"
authors:
  - name: "Dan Robitzski"
    link: "https://futurism.com/authors/danrobitzski"
url: "https://futurism.com/facebook-marketers-advertise-nazis"
categories:
  - "Future Society"
tags:
  - "advertising"
  - "communication"
  - "data"
  - "facebook"
---

# Facebook Reportedly Let Marketers Advertise to Nazis

![Once again, Facebook has been caught offering advertisers the ability to specifically market to neo-Nazis and people interested in Nazi music.](<https://futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/facebook-marketers-advertise-nazis.png>)
*\<em\>Image: Tag Hartman-Simkins\</em\>*

## Targeted Ads

Facebook's massive stash of user data allows advertisers to target their ideal customers with specially-crafted messages. However, several investigations have found that Facebook helps advertisers target specific unsavory demographics, including literal neo-Nazis, [according to *The Los Angeles Times*](<https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/la-fi-tn-facebook-nazi-metal-ads-20190221-story.html>).

In a recent attempt to test Facebook's advertising service, the *LA Times* found that it could pay just $25 to advertise to thousands of Facebook users interested in Nazi leaders Joseph Goebbels, Heinrich Himmler, and Josef Mengele, as well as fans of Nazi music.

## Déjà Vu

Every time Facebook is caught in another advertising scandal — like when *Pro Publica* [found in 2017](<https://www.propublica.org/article/facebook-enabled-advertisers-to-reach-jew-haters?utm_campaign=sprout&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&utm_content=1505419461>) that Facebook let advertisers target "Jew haters," when *The Intercept* found in 2018 that Facebook let advertisers target ["white genocide" conspiracy theorists](<https://theintercept.com/2018/11/02/facebook-ads-white-supremacy-pittsburgh-shooting/>), and this new development by the *LA Times —* the massive corporation [offers a weak acknowledgment](<https://futurism.com/zuckerberg-facebook-cambridge-analytica>) that such things shouldn't happen.

"Most of these targeting options are against our policies and should have been caught and removed sooner," Facebook spokesman Joe Osborne told *The LA Times*. "While we have an ongoing review of our targeting options, we clearly need to do more, so we’re taking a broader look at our policies and detection methods."

Meanwhile, Facebook raked in $55 billion from advertising sales in 2018, according to the *LA Times.*

## Who’s Driving This Thing?

In August, [Facebook announced](<https://www.facebook.com/business/news/keeping-advertising-safe-and-civil>) that it was deleting over 5,000 audience categories to prevent abuse or inappropriate uses of its advertising services. The *LA Times* reports that Facebook has maintained since 2017 that human employees review every single advertising category on the site.

Apparently, literal Nazis somehow managed to make the cut.

**READ MORE:** [Facebook decided which users are interested in Nazis — and let advertisers target them directly](<https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/la-fi-tn-facebook-nazi-metal-ads-20190221-story.html>) \[*The Los Angeles Times*\]

***More on Facebook: [Mark Zuckerberg Insists That Facebook Promotes Privacy](<https://futurism.com/mark-zuckerberg-facebook-promotes-privacy>)***

## Author
Dan Robitzki is a senior reporter for Futurism, where he likes to cover AI, tech ethics, and medicine. He spends his extra time fencing and streaming games from Los Angeles, California.

### Author social links  
[Twitter](<https://x.com/danrobitzski>)