Targeted advertising on online social platforms has become increasingly relevant in the political marketing toolkit. Monitoring political advertising is crucial to ensure accountability and transparency of democratic processes. Leveraging Meta public library of sponsored content, we study the extent to which political ads were delivered on Facebook and Instagram in the run up to 2022 Italian general election. Analyzing over 23 k unique ads paid by 2.7 k unique sponsors, with an associated amount spent of 4 M EUR and over 1 billion views generated, we investigate temporal, geographical, and demographic patterns of the political campaigning activity of main coalitions. We find results that are in accordance with their political agenda and the electoral outcome, highlighting how the most active coalitions also obtained most of the votes and showing regional differences that are coherent with the (targeted) political base of each group. Our work raises attention to the need for further studies of digital advertising and its implications for individuals' opinions and choices.

翻译：在网上社会平台上有针对性的广告在政治营销工具包中越来越具有相关性。监测政治广告对于确保民主进程的问责制和透明度至关重要。利用Meta获得赞助内容的公共图书馆,我们研究在2022年意大利大选之前在脸书和Instagram上发布政治广告的程度。分析2.7千个独特赞助者支付的23千个独特广告,相关金额为4千欧元,产生的观点超过10亿,我们调查主要联盟的政治竞选活动的时间、地理和人口模式。我们发现的结果符合其政治议程和选举结果,强调最活跃的联盟如何获得大多数选票,并显示与每个集团(目标)政治基础一致的区域差异。我们的工作使人们注意到需要进一步研究数字广告及其对个人意见和选择的影响。