Mozilla and its allies want Facebook and Google to place a moratorium — a temporary ban — on all political and issue ads in the UK, until the general elections are concluded on December 12. In an open letter to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and head of policy and communications, Nick Clegg, and to Google CEO Sundar Pichai and head of global affairs and chief legal officer, Kent Walker, Mozilla said that disinformation thrives online before elections, and both Google and Facebook's ad transparency tools are flawed. 'The UK has no time,' says Mozilla The letter's signatories — which include top executives from Mozilla, Demos, Doteeveryone, Institute for Strategic Dialogue, World Wide Web Foundation — recognise that companies' call for regulation is promising, and that political ads have got the attention of UK and European Commission lawmakers. But with the elections only six weeks away, there is no time for regulation to catch up, or for these issues to be resolved anytime soon. "These issues will take time to resolve, but in the UK we do not have time," it says. "We are aware that these policies are subject to debate both inside and outside the company. While that debate continues, people in the UK are left in uncertainty about whether they can trust what they see on the platform." The letter criticises Facebook for allowing politicians to lie in political ads. It also reminds Google and Facebook of the European Commission's recent statement that platforms could do better in dealing with…
