This month marks a historic moment for women in Ireland. On 25 May the country will take to the polls to decide the nation’s future stance on abortion.

It’s been a long time coming. In comparison to other countries in the developed world, Ireland is considered to still abide by tough and draconian abortion laws. Unlike the UK, terminations are even banned in cases of rape, if a mother’s health is at risk, incest, or if the foetus has fatal abnormalities.

Under the eighth amendment, or article 40.3.3 - which was introduced in 1983, a time when contraception was also illegal in Ireland - abortions are only permitted if a woman is at risk of dying as a direct result of her pregnancy.

And, if an Irish woman decides to take matters into her own hands, she can be jailed for up to 14 years for having an abortion, such as by taking abortion pills bought online.

In short: the referendum has the potential to finally give women control over their own bodies and their own futures.

Which is why Facebook has announced they’re banning foreign adverts related to the referendum on their site in the run up to the vote. If the social media network has learned anything of late, it’s that their adverts hold powers of persuasion for many.

One evident example is the recent Cambridge Analytica scandal that forced Facebook to admit that the network had improperly shared personal data belonging to 87 million of its users with the London-based political consultancy.

Thanks to a whistle-blower, the scandal revealed that the firm worked with Donald Trump’s election team, and the winning Brexit campaign, to harvest millions of Facebook profiles of voters, enabling them to build a powerful software tool to predict and influence choices made when casting votes.

Which leads us to ask the question: maybe Hillary Clinton would currently be the 45th president of America if Facebook had done more after they learned of the data breach?

Following suit, Google has now announced a similar standing with regards to adverts. However, the tech company is taking no chances and has instead confirmed an all-out advert ban.

Moving forward, the tech giants are making an attempt to do better – starting with the impending Irish abortion referendum. As the social media networks aims for change, stylist.co.uk explains everything you need to know, what campaigners think of the move, and exactly how it will affect your feed.

Why Facebook and Google are banning adverts in Ireland before the abortion referendum