Step 1: HUD files a complaint against Facebook for allowing ad targeting based on certain criteria.
Step 2: Facebook bans advertising targeting based on the criteria in the HUD complaint.
Step 3: Advertisers react by targeting based on demographic correlates of the categories from step #1.
Step 4: HUD notices that ads are still getting delivered more to one group than another.
GOTO STEP #1.
There's no clear point at which this process stops. Demographic correlates are numerous and strong. Are you going to ban all of them? That's tantamount to banning ad targeting generally!
FYI these are the specific points they are going after:
-display housing ads either only to men or women;
-not show ads to Facebook users interested in an "assistance dog," "mobility scooter," "accessibility" or "deaf culture";
-not show ads to users whom Facebook categorizes as interested in "child care" or "parenting," or show ads only to users with children above a specified age;
-to display/not display ads to users whom Facebook categorizes as interested in a particular place of worship, religion or tenet, such as the "Christian Church," "Sikhism," "Hinduism," or the "Bible."
-not show ads to users whom Facebook categorizes as interested in "Latin America," "Canada," "Southeast Asia," "China," "Honduras," or "Somalia."
-draw a red line around zip codes and then not display ads to Facebook users who live in specific zip codes.
Pretty damn clear: gender, race, disability and religion.
Your comment essentially restates the HUD's complaint. It doesn't engage with my discussion of the fundamental incompatibility of the HUD's regulatory regime and ad targeting in general. Nobody was ever convinced of anything by someone typing "FYI: [restatement of original premise]".
Creating an imaginary general problem as a way of attacking the specific issue is disingenuous.
