Hundreds of ads offering users to buy drugs were found on Meta platforms such as Instagram and Facebook. Now the US Congress is demanding that Mark Zuckerberg explain how these ads were missed during moderation. Engadget writes about it.

A new letter from Congress to Zuckerberg cites a report from the Tech Transparency Project, which showed 450 ads on Instagram and Facebook that “selling an array of pharmaceutical and other drugs.”

These ads show photos of various pills, powders, including cocaine, and more. Users are then offered to go to other services, such as Telegram, to make a purchase. Similar ads have already been found on X.

“Meta appears to have continued to shirk its social responsibility and defy its own community guidelines What is particularly egregious about this instance is that this was not user generated content on the dark web or on private social media pages, but rather they were advertisements approved and monetized by Meta. Many of these ads contained blatant references to illegal drugs in their titles, descriptions, photos, and advertiser account names, which were easily found by the researchers and journalists at the Wall Street Journal and Tech Transparency Project using Meta’s Ad Library. However, they appear to have passed undetected or been ignored by Meta’s own internal processes,” said in a letter addressed to Zuckerberg.

Now, Zuckerberg is being asked to provide details about Meta’s policy on compliance with the rules prohibiting drug advertising. They are also calling for information on how many views these ads have received and how many people have interacted with them.

A company representative commented on the situation by referring to a previous statement published in The Wall Street Journal, which said that the company had already rejected hundreds of thousands of such ads.