By Rob Leathern, Director of Product Management

We’re making advertising more transparent to help prevent abuse on Facebook, especially during elections. Today we’re starting to roll out the Ad Archive API, so researchers and journalists can more easily analyze Facebook ads related to politics or issues of national importance.

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.

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.

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.

If you’d like to access the API, please submit this form and we’ll respond after this initial test.