Ad Observer

A browser extension to share data about your social feed with researchers and journalists to increase transparency.
What is Ad Observer?
Ad Observer is a product of New York University's Online Political Ads Transparency Project. Formerly known as the Political Ad Collector, this browser extension works by collecting ads from a user's Facebook news feed, guessing which are political and contributing these to a database. It respects user privacy by not collecting personally identifiable information. The extension's primary purpose is facilitating research and journalism into Facebook, political messaging, and digital advertising strategies.

Extension stats

Users: 2,000+
Rating: 4.32 (28)
Version: 2.2.13 (ea4c344) (Last updated: 2022-11-09)
Creation date: 2020-06-09
Risk impact: Low risk impact
Risk likelihood: Low risk likelihood
Manifest version: 3
Permissions:
  • storage
  • unlimitedStorage
Size: 532.48K

Ranking

Other platforms

Ad Observer (v3.2.14)
3.95 (22) 879
Not available on Edge
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Extension summary

Analyze keywords

Ad Observer is a crowdsourcing tool that will gather ads from a user's Facebook news feed—to enable investigative journalism and research.

The project has new home and a new name. It is run by the Online Political Ads Transparency Project at New York University. This project used to be called the Political Ad Collector. Stewardship of the project was previously maintained by Quartz, The Globe and Mail and by ProPublica.

When users log into Facebook, the tool will collect the ads displayed on the user's news feed and guess which ones are political.

The tool does not collect any personally identifiable information. We will not know which ads are shown to which user. The political ads that are collected will be contributed to a database.

We use the ads for research and journalistic purposes: covering Facebook, political messaging and digital advertising tactics.

User reviews

These summaries are automatically generated weekly using AI based on recent user reviews. Chrome Web Store does not verify user reviews, so some user reviews may be inaccurate, spammy, or outdated.
Pros
  • Important tool for accountability
  • Helps document deceptive political advertising
  • Provides information to media organizations
  • Great idea and cause
Cons
  • Causes disruptions to using Facebook
  • Breaks Chrome startup settings
  • Issues with usability and functionality
Most mentioned
  • Important tool for accountability
  • Causes disruptions to using Facebook
  • Breaks Chrome startup settings
Recent reviews
Alright.
by Venator, 2020-07-11

An important tool for accountability - working for me with no disruptions to using facebook.
by M R, 2019-09-17

Facebook is ruining democracy for profit and this app helps to document it.
by Nicholas, 2018-10-30
View all user reviews

Extension safety

Risk impact

Ad Observer requires very minimum permissions.

Risk likelihood

Ad Observer has earned a fairly good reputation and likely can be trusted.

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