With the US Presidential Election season ramping up, the continuing extreme white supremacist reactions to the ongoing Black Lives Matter protests, the raging spread of COVID-19 conspiracy theories and false cures, and the Anti Vax cult already warming up to greet the production of a COVID-19 vaccine (should we be successful in creating one)... it can seem as though the internet is a cauldron of hate and fear-mongering madness.
Now more than ever, marketers need to be alert to how the credibility of their brands can be used to endorse bizarre and dangerous content, masquerading as fact or righteousness, through ads that appear against it.
In many cases, these are not the rantings of a few or the simple expressed fears of the many misinformed and misguided. Much of the disinformation spreading across the internet is organised. There is power behind much of the online published material that seeks to warp collective social understanding; minority interests, that seek to be popular… populist; the stuff that divides society for its own ends. This is not content that marketers want their ads to appear against.
The GDI (Global Disinformation Index) has identified 20,000+ monetised disinformation sites. These are websites that have been designed to twist opinion and garner support for ideas, policies and beliefs that can alter political courses, drive social disharmony and even undermine scientific evidence, for example, spreading doubt about climate change
GDI’s stated aim is to defund these sites by ensuring marketers are informed enough to take steps to avoid their ads inadvertently appearing on the sites of these often sophisticated and highly connected communications operations.
ISBA has just published its first guide for marketers to help avoid their ads appearing next to disinformation designed to divide societies and challenge the rational. In researching this topic, we wondered if the objective of some of these organisations to monetise their sites was not simply to boost their coffers from ad funding, but instead to steal an association with some of the world’s most trusted brands – just like the ancient Greeks duped the citizens of Troy with their gift of the wooden horse.
Disinformation is a serious brand safety issue and all brands need to invest in staying alert and in control to avoid being used by the organisations that spread it. Read the guidance now and share it with your agency and all intermediaries along your digital media supply chain.