‘We’ve only just started’: 1 year into GDPR, ad industry braces for more fines (Digiday)
Read the full article by Jessica Davies on digiday.com
Complacency is a dangerous mistress. But it’s a trap many companies are in danger of falling into when it comes to the General Data Protection Regulation, according to advertising sources.
The temptation to do as little as possible, so as to maintain ad revenues, is high. And with no seriously worrying fines levied yet at businesses, several publishers that had taken a strict approach to consent, have started to loosen their terms in order not to feel punished by falling ad revenues while their rivals flourish.
“There is a certain amount of complacency setting in,” said Andrew Buckman, COO of ad tech vendor Sublime. “Until a lot of people get a wrist slap [from regulators,] then people will carry on in this way and say, what’s the point if it is reducing my revenue?”
Yet privacy activists continue to file complaints specifically targeting the use of real-time-bidding techniques in programmatic advertising by ad tech companies, including Google. The latest to come through have been filed from The Netherlands, Belgium, and Spain. Whether or not real-time bidding can continue in its current form, is a note of serious contention between privacy activists and businesses that prefer to preserve the status quo.
