Advertising watchdog to track misleading ads on 3,000 digital platforms

NEW DELHI: The Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI) on Thursday said it will start monitoring 3,000 digital platforms for misleading ads. The body has partnered with TAM Media Research to monitor the digital platforms that include almost all search, video, and display ads.

These platforms include search engines such as Google and Yahoo! along with video platforms such as Youtube. ASCI will also monitor special interest sites like those for astrology and automobiles as well as news media sites for potentially misleading ads.

Initially, ASCI will track food and beverage, healthcare and education sectors on digital media as they accounted for 79% of the complaints processed by the industry body till last year.

Digital advertising is the fastest growing segment accounting for 30% of the total media spends in India which is expected to touch RS 91,641 crore according to an estimate by GroupM in February.

Rohit Gupta, chairman, ASCI, said "We live in a world that’s becoming more digital by the day, so a lot of marketing is shifting to such platforms. For a self-regulatory body, it makes sense to expand our monitoring of the offline space to include the online space as well."