This New Super PAC App Identifies Who Paid For Political Ads ... And How Much They Spent

super pac app

Photo: Video Screengrab

As political ads clog the airwaves, many of which are paid for by Super PACs’ hundreds of millions of dollars, it can be difficult to tell where certain commercials come from.Enter SuperPAC App, the Shazam of the political arena.

With the click of a button, the free app listens to the ad users are watching on television (it doesn’t work for radio) and compares the political ad with a database, powered by the audio fingerprinting company TuneSat.

The database then reveals which campaign/organisation paid for the spot, how much they spent on it, and allows users to check on the veracity of the ad’s claims with nonpartisan PolitiFact or To stay interactive, the app then lets users rate the ad as love, fair, fishy, or fail.

SuperPAC App was created by Dan Siegel and Jenn Hollett, former MIT Media Lab students.

“Because of the Citizens United decision, that Supreme Court decision, super PACs can exist,” Siegel told CNN, explaining why they created the app. “And what it means is that anyone who’s willing and able to write a check can have a voice in this election. And by anyone, that is a union, that is an individual, that is a company. And they can do so to an unlimited degree.”

Although SuperPAC App is all about ads, it is ad-free and was funded by a Knights Foundation grant.

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