Facebook bans foreign advertisers for Ireland abortion referendum

LONDON — Facebook faced a wave of criticism for missing interference by Russian groups during the 2016 presidential campaign in the United States. Now it is making Ireland an early test case for new policies meant to block such meddling.

With a contentious May 25 referendum on Ireland’s abortion ban approaching, Facebook said Tuesday that it would block political ads from groups based outside the country. The Menlo Park company also recently introduced a tool so users can see all the ads a group is posting on its network, in a bid to increase transparency of political campaigning.