ftc moves looks at privacy rulemaking
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On September 8, the Federal Trade Commission conducted an online “Commercial Surveillance and Data Security Rulemaking Forum” as a follow-up to the release of the Advance Notice of Public Rulemaking on the same subject.
AAF Executive Vice President-Government Affairs Clark Rector spoke at the Forum. In his comments he noted AAF supports the adoption of a national privacy law but believes Congress is the appropriate body to enact that law, noting that AAF has and is urging Congress to do so. He took exception to the tone of the ANPR pointing out it failed to recognize the many benefits of the responsible use of data and data-driven advertising.
MediaPost published an op-ed by Rector explaining AAF’s views on the matter.
AAF objects to the pejorative term “commercial surveillance” as it casts an unfair, negative light on a practice that when appropriately done is beneficial to and accepted by businesses and most consumers.
The AAF has also joined a letter to the Commission requesting an extension of the public comment period on the ANPR from October 21 to December 20, 2022.
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california enacts problematic child online protection law
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California Governor Gavin Newsom has signed into law the Age-Appropriate Design Code Act intended to protect children online. While AAF supports protecting children online, we believe the new law is seriously flawed and AAF signed a letter urging the Governor to veto it.
Among other flaws, the new law defines a child as anyone under the age of eighteen. The federal Children’s Online Privacy Protection Rule defines a child as being under the age of 13 and the California Consumer Privacy Act and California Privacy Rights Act recognizes categories of under thirteen, thirteen to fifteen and sixteen and older. The bills overly broad standards would include the vast majority of websites of even minimal interest to anyone under the age of 18 and its age-verification requirements would greatly degrade the online experience for adults as well as children.
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protecting the deductibility of advertising
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Perhaps the most important government affairs issue for AAF members is preserving advertising’s federal tax status as a normal and necessary business expense fully deductible in the current year. AAF is a founding member of The Advertising Coalition, a group of associations and companies that work together on the issue. One of our strategies is to arrange grassroots meetings between House and Senate members of the congressional tax writing committees and their constituents from the advertising industry. Many AAF club members from across the country have attended these meetings. One of the most recent was with Representative Dan Kildee, D-Mich., a member of the House Ways and Means Committee. Dave Perry, President of AAF Greater Flint reports:
When I got the call from Clark Rector at AAF to help mobilize a grassroots meeting with our local Congressman Dan Kildee in my town of Flint, Michigan, I was excited to help make that happen. The group that was assembled for this meeting was a great representation of the local advertising landscape; TV, radio, agency and several others were present to give a face to the impact that advertising has in this community. The meeting went well, and we covered a lot of ground supported by a lot of facts and figures, on why the deductibility of advertising expenses is vital to the sustainability of this industry and why Congressman Kildee, a member of the House Ways and Means Committee, needs to be on our side when discussion of this subject comes up on the Hill. I was honored to be called to duty on behalf of the AAF and the advertising industry and feel that this is the heart of what the AAF does for its membership and the reason involvement is so vital.
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aaf encourages advertising industry to vote
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The American Advertising Federation, along with many of our allied industry partners has joined forces with Voting Maven to increase voter participation within the Advertising & Media industry. The goal is to empower all advertising professionals with the information resources they need to exercise their right to vote.
Complete information can be found at votingmaven.org (Media & Advertising Voters Engaging Now), a non-partisan mid-term voting information destination for the industry, by the industry. There a voter can find everything she or he needs to know, including polling location, early voting rules, ballot information, and voter registration status.
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daa provides political ads disclosure solution
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AAF is a participant in The Digital Advertising Alliance (DAA), a consortium of leading national advertising and marketing trade groups that together deliver effective, self-regulatory solutions to online consumer issues. The DAA has provided this update for AAF members about their political advertising tools.
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political ads and voter transparency: how to ensure political clients deliver necessary campaign disclosures unobtrusively in digital and mobile ads
With the primary season over, and the mid-term general election now upon us, it’s a good time to revisit just how to deliver campaign disclosures with every mobile and digital political ad our member agencies deliver on behalf of political clients.
The Digital Advertising Alliance (DAA) – in which AAF is a founder – has simplified its Political Ads Program in such a way that it’s easy for agencies to leverage on behalf of their clients.
When DAA first launched the Application of Principles of Transparency and Accountability to Political Advertising (pdf) and an accompanying voter education site in 2018, the focus was on having companies build mechanisms into their own platforms to help their political advertisers with compliance, for example delivering the Political Ad icon and required disclosures in ads.
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The DAA Political Ads Principles were developed in a cross-industry fashion to be responsive to concerns raised by the US Congress and other elected stakeholders about the transparency in digital political advertisements. Several US states and the national elections regulators in Canada have supported or adopted the Principles in various ways. This demonstrates the ability of the responsible digital advertising industry to be responsive to and effective at delivering on its promises. As the Wall Street Journal reported when we launched, “…marketers and advertising platforms have a vested interest in cleaning up the digital ad ecosystem and making it more transparent, particularly as brand-safety concerns continue to crop up.”
According to the DAA Principles, the icon and optional “Political Ad” wording (also available in Spanish) on the marker should link to disclosures that include:
- Name of the political advertiser;
- Phone number, address, website, or alternative and reliable contact information for the advertiser;
- Link to a government database of contributions and expenditures for the advertiser, if applicable;
- Name(s) of the advertiser’s CEO, executive committee, board of directors or treasurer,
- Any disclaimers required by state or federal law, if the ad itself is too small to display them (as permitted by applicable law); and
- Other information required by applicable federal or state law for such notices.
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In consultation with several companies and in cooperation with DAA’s global partner, Digital Advertising Alliance of Canada – which also has a version of Political Ads Principles north of the border, DAA has undertaken three program enhancements to make adherence to the Principles easier for political advertisers, with the active support of their agencies:
- A self-service platform (with onboarding and training support), where each political advertiser (or their agency) can enable icon and disclosure delivery tagged to each and every political ad by the advertiser, the campaign, and the creative they handle.
- An application programming interface (API) that enables the same real-time disclosures, can integrate with agencies’ own programmatic offerings.
- A public Political Ad registry service – available both to self-service and API users – which many demand-side and other ad tech platforms might choose to use, complement, or integrate. (Several states now require political advertisers in a respective state to maintain a public-facing registry or database of political ads associated with a candidate.)
A recent webinar DAA organized with its legal counsel, MediaMath, and Campaigns & Elections magazine showcases these enhancements, their functionality and their benefits to agencies. A recording is available here. If you’d like to get on board or extend your use of the Political Ads program, contact DAA’s Chet Dalzell directly chet@aboutads.info or get started here.
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2023 advertising day on the hill
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Preparations are underway for the AAF’s next Advocacy and Action: Advertising Day on the Hill Thursday, March 23, 2023, in Washington, DC.
As a vivid demonstration of our grassroots in action, the Advertising Day on the Hill is one of the most important days on the AAF calendar. In the morning, participants are briefed on the issues facing the advertising industry. The afternoon is spent in meetings with lawmakers and their staffs educating them about the issues and the importance of advertising to the U.S. economy.
Few things make as a profound impact on elected officials as constituents passionate enough about their industry to travel to our nation’s Capital to make their voices heard.
Registration opens soon. For now, mark your calendars for March 23, 2023, and start making plans to join us in Washington, DC for AAF’s Advocacy and Action: Advertising Day on the Hill to make your voice heard.
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The AAF protects and promotes advertising at all levels of government through grassroots activities. Our nation-wide network monitors advertising-related legislation on local, state and federal levels. We put our members face-to-face with influential lawmakers while encouraging self-regulation as a preemptor to government intervention, when appropriate of course. To learn more about our advocacy efforts, click here.
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