Google silent on how major Australian brand ads were served on white supremacist website
A number of major Australian brands have had ads running on a white supremacist website after Google’s ad technology systems failed to pick up the error.
On Thursday ads for Fitness First, TPG, Paypal, LastMinute.com, Xero, Sydney Harbour Bridge Climb and the Australian Institute of Management were being displayed on The White Voice, alongside house ads for the US-based white supremacist site’s book Murdering Multiculturalism.
Google has declined to explain why systems in the Google Display Network failed to pick up the ads on the site which carries articles entitled “How feminism and ‘white privilege’ are not compatible”, “5 questions whites must ask themselves after the Islamist terror attack in Paris,” and “Facts & consequences about young white women taking black men to bed”.
The Google ads have since been removed from the site.
More sites = more revenue. Google can’t be trusted to ensure sites like this don’t end up on their network.
Just another instance of the race to the bottom in online advertising. Just because you can buy ads cheaply via programmatic exchanges doesn’t mean that you should.
Whatever happened to the value of context and content when buying media? The right ad to the right person at the right time?
Advertisers and agencies have only themselves to blame – if you lie with dogs you’re going to get fleas.
@dominic c – “the right ad to the right person at the right time”… that is programmatic my friend.
The issue here isn’t with programmatic technology but more so with google allowing a site like this onto their inventory.
Sounds like you must work for a publisher that has had its budget sacked from the rise of the machines.
Maybe you should all stop trusting these ridiculous agency trading desks and their loose safety policies and start looking at independents / proven providers.
Just a thought – worked for us!
It’s naive to think that brand safety issues like this have only occurred since the age of the exchange. Ever since there has been an intermediary between buyer and seller, this has been an issue. Some dodgy (but smart) businesses are out there constantly working around existing technology to get a share of ad revenue. It’s an arms race that is constantly escalating, and it is an inevitable part of the landscape. Regardless, buyers see brand safety issues more as an opportunity for makegoods and discounts than they’re actually worried about the impact. And of course they’re gold for media blogs!
What does it matter? Nobody would’ve seen the ads anyways. Who looks at banner ads? Not even white supremacists are that dumb.
Google silent? No surprise there: Google is run by non-human bots which haven’t been programmed to act (ummm…) responsibly. Oh, and there’s no problem with Google’s massive tax shuffling tricks either.
Do no evil? Ha!!