Privacy Schmivacy… says no one.

Remember the DOJ vs Google antitrust trials? We'll be headed back to Virginia for the remedies phase of the adtech trial in just under a month; but in the meantime, the search remedies decision is expected to drop any moment now. What happens now that Google’s been declared a monopoly?

To unwind Google's search monopoly, one proposed remedy is for Google to offload its Chrome browser… and Perplexity AI has a $34.5 billion bid in.

What’s the problem with Perplexity potentially snatching up Chrome? Chrome accounts for over 67% of global internet browsing, so a browser isn’t the only thing they'd be getting. Perplexity would own an unprecedented amount of user data across search, websites, and ad inventory, all of which fuel targeted advertising. If there's anything we've learned from the last two decades of Google's reign over adland, data is power. If Perplexity, as a new entrant in the advertising game, were to fast-track its access to this much data, it could have a massive impact on not just the ad industry, but on every one of us.

Hitting the Stage, and that’s not a good thing

Stagwell, an agency holding company, is in the preliminary stages of its ad-planning tool, Stage. To build it, Stagwell is testing a partnership with Palantir.

Their choice of partner in Palantir is raising concerns. As Arielle pointed out last year, “For the ad industry, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to tell where one industrial complex begins and another ends.” In an industry that’s always pushing back against its reputation for being creepy and intrusive, working with a company that’s a key player in the surveillance business is...a choice.

The plug is pulled in the EU

In this week's episode of Google's malicious compliance, starting this September, Google is pulling the plug on political ads in the EU in response to the new EU regulation 2024/900.

The regulation sets strict rules on how political information is shared and requires transparency so citizens can see when they’re viewing political ads, who is behind them, and whether they are receiving a targeted ad. Google is refusing to comply; and instead is choosing to withdraw from offering political ads entirely.

While they have committed to not running ads that may influence the election, Google will still be sharing some political info, such as official messages from EU member states. Meta made a similar announcement last month.

Why is this relevant? This is a major shift in how political speech is being distributed online in Europe. Cutting off one of the largest platforms months before the election can reshape how campaigns reach voters. We've seen how moves like this by large platforms tend to play out. Rules like this only really impact legitimate actors that actually follow the rules - not the countless others that are quite happy exploiting loopholes and reaping the benefits of lacklster policy enforcement. 

Meta’s AI enforcement is nonexistent. Are we surprised?

Our Director of Intelligence put it best: “seriously, wtf?” U.S. lawmakers are calling for an investigation after learning that Meta’s AI chatbots were permitted to:

1. engage children in so-called "sensual" conversations
2. generate false medical information
3. help users argue racist claims
4. create disinformation, as long as the chatbot included an acknowledgement that the material it created was indeed false

The 200+ page policy was approved by Meta’s legal, policy, engineering teams, and chief ethicists. So seriously — wtf Meta?

Google says “AI is helping publishers” or something

Google’s narrative is that their AI overviews are helping publishers, claiming publishers receive “more queries and higher quality clicks”. However, publishers watching their traffic have proven otherwise - publisher traffic is down over 30%, by some estimates.

And it’s not only Google. Platforms across the board are softening the language, reframing metrics, and throwing out vague promises about supporting journalism.

@Publishers, trust your own data, not their narrative. 

The UK gave the greenlight to the Omnicom-IPG merger

The UK has approved the Omnicom-IPG Merger, bringing the industry one big step closer to creating the world’s largest advertising and marketing agency. Yikes.

This merger will combine two of the biggest players in the business, reshaping the global ad market and putting even more power in the hands of a single firm. This is something we have been cautioning and advocating against since the announcement that this deal was in the works.

But, just because this merger was approved by the CMA, it doesn't mean that this story is over.

Arielle said after we submitted our comments to the UK and Australia competition authorities, "Regulators are keen to learn more about principal trading and agency deals with big tech, looking to understand how they impact the market, and advertisers in particular. Irrespective of whether competition regulators take action to stop the Omnicom-IPG acquisition, their review of the deal is illuminating these practices and industry dynamics.”

The merger isn’t final yet. Additional regulators in the EU and elsewhere still have to give the green light. We are hopeful that despite this approval, regulators around the world will examine the entrenched and unfair business practices, including principal trading, that we and other folks have flagged.