What would happen in the physical world with, say, a classified ad in a newspaper? It's on the poster of the ad to follow the law, not the paper, is it not?
If you created an ad with "over 40 need not apply" most newspapers would reject the ad.
However this case goes over and above. Facebook is actively adding a feature to screen users by age which increases their culpability.
The material difference between newspapers and facebook is that anyone is allowed to buy a newspaper, but someone of a protected class cannot view ads on facebook that are not targeted to them even if they want to, thus they are excluded.
Seems no different than advertising a job in young skewing magazines vs targeting older demos.
If you were seizing on "real world", I think it's pretty clear I meant "physical" rather than "virtual" since we're comparing newspapers to online ads, but I updated the post to clarify.
And I generally agree. The authorities should be going after the perpetrators, not the neutral platform.
The party which should be pursued is the one posting the post which goes contrary to law.
I'm ok if FB or CL proactively root out those posts, but I'm not so sure I see it as their responsibility to do. It's good oversight but still I feel the people who should be punished are the agents of the wrongdoing.
So, no, I don't see them as an accessory to the crime.
That said, the companies/individuals doing the actual discrimination and or illegal solicitation should face the consequences of their actions. In this case, I'm not condoning companies discriminating on the basis of age.
Not calling out Craigslist --simply illustrating that regular tools meant to be used responsibly can be abused to accomplish nefarious ends.
With that example in mind, that puts someone running the ad in a weird place, since literally every ad network in 2017 does demographic targeting.
I don't think it's feasible to vet every ad that runs to ensure that the poster is complying with the law.
All that being said, this smells like Facebook, much like any other popular virtual public square, hiding behind the "We're an open platform!" defense when convenient to avoid legal action, and hiding behind the "We're a private company!" defense when convenient to disclaim accusations of poor or inconsistent moderation. They should not get to have it both ways. Either they exercise editorial control and can be liable for what their users post, or they can keep their hands off and push that liability back to the poster.
Rant aside, I'm more interested in the general case of demographic targeting when it comes to certain ads.