The regulatory insider

The change, which was announced to clients earlier this month, will take effect in January 2024 and will impact YouTube Select video inventory on CTV. Advertisers will still be able to negotiate using Comscore and Nielsen co-viewing estimates. Google's co-viewing data will not however, be incorporated into Nielsen's own assessments. Co-watching has grown in significance in the digital era, despite its elusive nature, particularly for YouTube and other platforms whose share of TV viewing is rising.

We’ve all seen the news. Greek islands on fire. Record temperatures in Southern Europe. Protesters demanding action on climate change. It’s no surprise that businesses taking positive action want to tell consumers what steps they’re taking to be environmentally responsible. We’ve seen a big uptick in the number of advertisers making environmental claims. Whether the ad promotes compostable packaging, energy efficient heating products, tree planting schemes or farming techniques aimed at increasing biodiversity, we need to be sure that advertising messages on commercial radio are honest and truthful with customers.

On July 3rd, the WHO has released a new guideline on policies to protect children from the harmful impact of food marketing. The guideline recommends countries implement comprehensive mandatory policies to protect children of all ages from the marketing of foods and non-alcoholic beverages that are high in saturated fatty acids, trans-fatty acids, free sugars and/or salt (HFSS). Policy decisions based on this guideline should be adapted to the local contexts of WHO regions and Member States. Adoption of the recommendation and adaptation to country contexts require local consultations, with mechanisms in place to safeguard public health policy-making from undue influence by real, perceived or potential conflicts of interest.

TikTok will face a fine over its handling of children’s data in the EU following a decision made Friday by the European Data Protection Board (EDPB). The decision is part of an investigation launched in 2021 into whether TikTok had violated the EU’s data protection rules, known as GDPR, by failing to ensure its age verification processes sufficiently protected the privacy of children between the age of 13 and 17.

Many conversations around sustainability in advertising focus specifically on carbon emissions. As such, a lot of effort has been put into measuring the carbon emissions generated by the creation and distribution of ads. This is certainly a good thing in terms of reducing the industry’s impact on the environment. But sustainability goes beyond just carbon emissions. ‘ESG’ – environmental, social, and governance – frameworks used within the finance sector look at sustainability much more broadly.

It’s only fitting that YouTube, which has long coveted TV’s ad dollars and advertisers, finds out what it feels like to be treated like TV. Many of us are waiting to see the right level of outrage directed at YouTube from advertisers and agencies. What’s the right level of outrage? As one advertiser said to me: “Can you imagine the reaction and consequences if this fraud was done by TV? There would be absolute hell to pay."

Sports publishers are geared up to cover the FIFA Women’s World Cup, which kicks off today in Australia and New Zealand, with new editorial features, live blogs, newsletters, podcasts, social media posts and video. And some of those publishers, like digital video-focused Team Whistle and women’s sports newsletter company The Gist, are drawing in more ad revenue from sponsorships around their coverage of the women’s tournament compared to the men’s FIFA World Cup that took place last year. Meanwhile, some media companies, like sports business publisher Front Office Sports, are making about the same in ad revenue from both World Cups, but even that is notable, given the historic inequality in marketing investment in women’s sports.

The European Commission on Tuesday (July 11th) set out a plan in a bid to take the lead in the metaverse - shared virtual worlds accessible through the internet - and to prevent Big Tech dominating a nascent sphere that could boost economic growth. The EU executive said its initiative aims to reflect EU values and fundamental rights and create an open and interoperable metaverse, an area where it estimates the global market size will exceed 800 billion euros by 2030 from 27 billion last year. The scheme includes bringing together creators, media companies and others to create an industrial ecosystem, setting up regulatory sandboxes to help companies test out the metaverse and rolling out skills development programmes as well virtual public services.

The EU’s suggestion that Google divests its ad tech business has come as welcome news to other vendors looking for a fairer playing field. “Changing behaviour is going to be hard,” says Paola Colombo, General Manager, Ad Tech & Business Development at Publitalia ’80. “That’s why a decision like having them breaking their stack and selling some of the parts could definitely be a solution".

Seven companies including Amazon, Apple, Google, Facebook-owner Meta and Microsoft say they meet the EU's new criteria of "gatekeeper" that means they have to meet tougher rules, EU industry chief Thierry Breton said on Tuesday. Samsung and TikTok owner ByteDance also unexpectedly said they would meet the criteria, although TikTok disputed whether it should be included on the list. Booking.com said it expected to fall into the gatekeeper category next year.

On 15 June, the incoming Spanish Presidency outlined its priorities on its website. The Presidency will begin on 1 July and will end on 31 December. The key priorities range from movement towards the digital and ecological transition to concrete actions to combat climate change. Other priorities include the promotion of strategic industries and technologies in Europe, the expansion of trade relationships, support for Ukraine, the introduction of minimum and common standards of corporation tax and the completion of the unions for banking and capital markets.  

The French Data Protection Authority CNIL fined Criteo, an ad tech business, for five breaches of the GPDR. They comprise of the failures to demonstrate that the data subject gave it consent (1), to comply with the obligation of information and transparency (2), to respect the right of access (3), to comply with the right to withdraw consent and erasure of data (4) and to provide for an agreement between joint controller (5). Criteo is planing to appeal the decision.

This unique collaboration means that ARPP members can now quickly and easily confirm the compliance of audiovisual advertising before it is broadcast on television. This led to a service for automatic recovery of the "PubID" identifier and pre-broadcast notices, using the INA Signature (fringerprint technology) solution. Thanks to INA Signature, ARPP members can now, on the basis of audiovisual advertising content whose PubID is unknown, automatically identify it - as well as the ARPP's notice, where applicable.

Thomas Rabe (RTL Group CEO) says companies must not be ‘burdened with bureaucracy’ at time of angst for national economy. The current proposal foresees to ban HFSS advertising from 17.00 to 22.00 on weekdays with additional time slots on the weekend, while the Minister's proposal originally suggested a ban from 6.00 to 23.00.

France, Spain and the Netherlands set to get two more seats each in next mandate. Wouter Wolfs, a researcher at KU Leuven’s Public Governance Institute, wrote that France, Belgium and Poland were the “big winners” because their extra seats were “not necessarily required” to stay in keeping with the principles governing the Parliament’s composition. 

Google is launching new tools to help users track and delete search results about themselves like untrue information, unwanted contact details, or copyright violations, a move to assuage users’ concerns about privacy.

Meta intends to ask users in the European Union for their consent before allowing businesses to target advertising based on what they view on its services such as Facebook and Instagram, the social media giant said on Tuesday. Meta said the change is to address a number of evolving regulatory requirements in the region and stems from an order in January by Ireland's Data Protection Commissioner, Meta's lead EU regulator, to reassess the legal basis on how it targets ads.

The Norwegian Data Protection Authority ordered U.S. technology firm Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, to stop showing users in Norway personalized ads based on their online activity and estimated locations. The ban on so-called behavioral advertising will last three months, starting from August 4. Facebook and Instagram will be able to show people customized ads but only based on information given by users in the "about" section of their profiles. Meta will face daily fines of 1 million Norwegian Krone (€89,500) if it doesn’t comply with the order. 

An Adalytics study of Google's advertising practices prompts him to come forward. The report finds that advertisers including Fortune 500 brands, the US federal government, and many small businesses may have been misled for years about Google’s proprietary TrueView skippable in-stream video ads. “Google promises to know exactly to whom advertising is being played out - and to charge for it in a targeted manner. The study strips these promises like the emperor's new clothes," says Zinggl in an interview with DER STANDARD (in German).

Free and ad-supported? The next generation of streaming TV looks awfully like the ghost of TV past. In its decade-long life, traditional streaming has created a marketplace of warehouses, essentially shopfronts operated by studios or broadcasters [...]. That landscape is now being reshaped in real time, affected by the competing dynamics of rising operating and programming costs, and downward pressure on the consumer’s budget. In short, streaming TV can’t afford itself. And the visible effect is streamers pulling content offline, to reduce their own licensing and residual costs.

Advertising research organisation Adalytics reported last week that its research identified that many advertisers paying for TrueView ads running outside YouTube on other websites and apps might not be getting what they paid for. The firm reviewed the ad campaigns of over 1,000 brands across the internet, and found many of the TrueView ads did not meet Google’s own guidelines, including some ads that were run in small video players in the corner or at the side of the screen, some which were fully muted, had no actual video content between ads, or ran with little interaction or activation from the user.

Should the television industry be worried about artificial intelligence (AI) or excited? Or both? Each day seems to bring fresh warnings that AI will wreck businesses, cast thousands out of work and even destroy the human race. So, is TV safe? Judge for yourself from this little experiment. “Can you suggest a format for a new television gameshow?” I asked the AI chatbot ChatGPT.