The introduction of the Digital Services Act earlier in 2024 put Online Platforms under the spotlight of European regulators. A plethora of new requirements coupled with considerable uncertainty around the key question: is my property an Online Platform?
Your legal team is certainly best placed to answer that question for you. What we can tell you however, having recently launched a new solution for advanced advertising transparency, is what we think DSA-level disclosures on an Online Platform property should look like.
First of all, some legal context (skip this part if you’ve already spent way too much time poring over the text of the DSA on EUR-Lex):
An Online Platform is defined as “a hosting service that, at the request of a recipient of the service*, stores and disseminates information to the public” (Art. 3(i)). The key factor coming into play is the transfer of information from a user to one or more other users, either being a natural person (e.g. a consumer) or a legal person (e.g. a company).
* “Business users, consumers and other users are considered to be ‘recipients of the service’ for the purpose of this Regulation” (Rec. 2).
The Digital Services Act provides additional definitions for specific categories of companies falling under the umbrella of “Online Platforms”, including among others:
- Online Marketplaces (described as “online platforms allowing consumers to conclude distance contracts with traders”)
- Very Large Online Platforms (defined under Art. 33 as “online platforms which have a number of average monthly active recipients of the service in the Union equal to or higher than 45 million”)
These types of Platforms have the same obligations as all “regular” Online Platforms, plus a few additional ones linked to their specific role in the market.
All types of Online Platforms are subject to specific advertising transparency requirements under the DSA. The main provision on this topic calls for the following (see Art. 26):
- Providers of online platforms that present advertisements on their online interfaces shall ensure that, for each specific advertisement presented to each individual recipient, the recipients of the service are able to identify, in a clear, concise and unambiguous manner and in real time, the following:
- that the information is an advertisement, including through prominent markings, which might follow standards pursuant to Article 44;
- the natural or legal person on whose behalf the advertisement is presented;
- the natural or legal person who paid for the advertisement if that person is different from the natural or legal person referred to in point (b);
- meaningful information directly and easily accessible from the advertisement about the main parameters used to determine the recipient to whom the advertisement is presented and, where applicable, about how to change those parameters.
And now, on to the preview. Based on the above and on extensive market research, what do we recommend your advertising disclosures should look like if you are interested in delivering enhanced levels of transparency?
With first-party ads, you’re in full control: you know your audience, you know which segments you’re trying to reach with each campaign, and you’re rendering your own creatives. You already have all the information you need to disclose to the consumer: all you need is a set of tools to do so.
AdChoices Icon
Use this widely-recognised consumer-facing symbol of advertising transparency to clearly indicate to your audience that they’re looking at an ad, and that more information about that ad is just one click away.
Add the Icon layer in-house through your ad server or SSP, or rely on a trusted Icon Provider to do so for you.
Enhanced Transparency Page
Include all the transparency information you need to disclose in a separate, dedicated page, giving consumers a chance to get to know who’s behind that ad they saw on your property. Render it however you prefer, or take advantage of the pre-structured template made available to you.
Choice & Control
If applicable, include in the page a link directing consumers to a tool or portal where they can change their preferences on the parameters used to personalise ads to them. For the Profiling parameter, you can easily integrate the intuitive ON/OFF consumer tool available at YourOnlineChoices.eu.
And for a final look at the results:
Interested in learning more about these tools, and how they can be integrated into your platform
to deliver DSA-level information to consumers?
EDAA’s Advanced Advertising Transparency Programme is here to help!
Contact us at aatp@edaa.eu for more info,
or apply for participation here:
