Companies have struggled in recent years to reach potential customers and, at the same time, ensure that their online ads do not appear near dubious, lewd or potentially harmful content. AARP, which was mentioned in the NewsGuard report as one of the companies that placed advertisements on websites promoting false electoral claims, said that despite strict monitoring procedures, some advertisements had escaped through the cracks.
“We follow strict ad placement protocols, but no system is 100% foolproof,” said Martha Boudreau, executive vice president of AARP, in a statement.
An internal AARP review found that “a small portion” of its ads, less than 1/100 of 1 percent, appeared on sites flagged by NewsGuard, added Boudreau.
Matt Skibinski, general manager of NewsGuard, said that companies should treat sites that publish incorrect information in the same way that they treat sites that promote behavior that does not align with their corporate values or that publish content that they do not wish to be associated with.
“In many brands, there is someone whose job is to make sure that they do not place ads in environments that they would call unsafe or inappropriate environments, and that includes violence, pornography and gambling,” said Skibinski. “We need the industry to start seeing misinformation in that category – to create damage in the real world.”
NewsGuard reported that Procter & Gamble ads appeared on The Gateway Pundit, one of the sites it called on to publish incorrect information about the elections. In an email, Procter & Gamble said it had not intentionally advertised on the website. Erica Noble, a spokeswoman for Procter & Gamble, said that when the company’s ads are placed on a website that does not meet its standards, it acts quickly to remove them.
“These are all the patterns that existed long before the terrible January 6 events, but we appreciate that they have a renewed importance now,” she said.