Issue-based advertising

Abstract

Issue-based advertising is a form of paid-for advertising which advocates for broad political and legislative issues rather than specific candidates or political parties. It is a relevant problem when it comes to regulating the online environment. Platforms provide politically motivated actors with the opportunity to make use of a large amount of personal data and micro-target advertising. Many of these advertisements are paid for or run by actors with no formal political affiliation. To better understand who caters what kinds of messages with potentially political goals and to which audiences, meaningful transparency should be required from both advertisers and online platforms. This is highlighted in the 2018 Code of Practice on Disinformation (Code), issue-based advertising, however, is undefined here. Instead, the text requires signatories to come up with their own definition. Relying on signatories’ self-reports, press releases, and content policy explanations, this report maps the terminology and descriptions used by signatories and the European Commission. As our analysis shows, each signatory approaches issue-based advertising differently; what they mean by the term and how they operationalise it in their policies, however, is rarely defined.