WFA calls on brands to be responsible in online targeting

Share/Save/Bookmark

19/11/2014
Back to the overview
On the 18 November at the 8th EU Multi-Stakeholder Roundtable on Online Behavioral Advertising (OBA), the WFA made a commitment to the European Commission to call on responsible advertisers to take an active role in encouraging agencies and third party ad networks to participate in the European self-regulatory Programme on OBA.

The Programme provides both notice and choice to the consumer, allowing them to identify when advertising is being delivered based on their online behavior and providing them with the information and tools to exercise a choice as to whether to receive OBA in the future. The provision of both transparency and choice directly contributes to enhancing consumer trust in the online advertising world.

Stephan Loerke, Managing Director of the WFA, said: “It is critical to the long-term growth of the European Interactive Digital Advertising Alliance (EDAA) programme that advertisers recognize the efforts of third parties in the supply chain to enhance transparency and consumer choice in the online advertising ecosystem. We are calling on all our members to factor into their OBA procurement decisions third party participation in the European OBA self-regulatory programme and attainment of the TRUSTSEAL. Ultimately, partners in the supply chain must see a business rationale for participation in the programme in order to ensure the sustainability of self-regulation in this space and ultimately the future responsibility of the ecosystem.”

Commenting on the EDAA programme, Robert Madelin, Director-General of DG CONNECT, European Commission, said: "There are two reasons why I think the world of advertising should be getting behind OBA and the EDAA in the early period of the Juncker Commission. The first is that advertising needs to manage its own brand; advertisers can sell their chocolate, but they are not very good at selling self-regulation of advertising to the broader public opinion in Europe. [...] Secondly, I personally believe very strongly that self-regulation is an extremely efficient way of delivering what society expects at lower costs for advertisers and faster to market than rules and regulations can achieve."

WFA will be developing tools that members can use internally to expedite this process and to ensure that, in the future, participation in the EDAA programme will be a necessary prerequisite for third parties willing to do business with responsible advertisers.

For more information contact Chris Payne at [email protected]

Watch Robert Madelin, Director-General at DG CONNECT, European Commission, on self-regulation in digital advertising:




Sign up to monthly WFA news