ASA targets stronger online regulation with new five-year strategy
Regulator responds to online shift in advertising, pledging to simplify complaint methods
The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has launched a new five-year strategy in which it hopes to strengthen the regulation of online advertising in the UK.
The watchdog said it has chosen to focus its regulatory efforts on online adverts as “businesses are increasingly advertising online…and the pace of change online is contributing to people’s concerns.”
One area of priority is protecting vulnerable people and children from exposure to age-restricted adverts in the gambling, alcohol and the food industry.
The ASA will conduct a full review of its existing processes with the aim of improving efficiency and operational effectiveness, and will also assess the possibility of implementing “lighter-touch” methods by which individuals can flag concerns about advertising. It will also examine the possibility of applying machine learning to the regulation of advertising in the UK.
Announcing the new strategy at the ASA’s conference in Manchester, Lord Currie, chairman of the ASA, said: “The new strategy will ensure that protecting consumers remains at the heart of what we do but that our system is also fit for purpose when regulating newer forms of advertising. This also means harnessing new technology to improve our ways of working in identifying problem ads.”
Qualifying the decision to increase its focus on the online sector, the ASA said 88% of the 7,099 adverts amended or withdrawn by businesses following ASA action in 2017 were online adverts.
The ASA also confirmed that two-thirds of the 19,000 cases it resolved during 2017 were about online ads.
ASA CEO Guy Parker hailed the evolution of the ASA during the previous five years, adding: “We’re a much more proactive regulator as a result of the work we’ve done in the last five years.
“In the next five, we want to have even more impact regulating online advertising. Online is already well over half of our regulation, but we’ve more work to do to take further steps towards our ambition of making every UK ad a responsible ad.”