InPublishing article
April 27, 2022

The Trustworthy Accountability Group (TAG), an advertising industry self-regulatory organisation aimed at fighting criminal activity and strengthening brand safety in the digital advertising supply chain, has released the first annual report for TAG’s Project Brand Integrity.

TAG’s Project Brand Integrity (PBI) is an initiative established to protect advertisers from negative brand association by alerting them when their ads run on pirate sites in Europe.

The report found that direct outreach by PBI prompted a large majority of advertisers (79%) to reduce their ad impressions on pirate sites, with nearly half of that group (43%) ending nearly all ads on such sites. Among the brands that reduced their ads, there was an overall reduction of advertising on pirate sites by nearly two-thirds (66%).

“Sometimes the most powerful tool for change is actionable information,” said Nick Stringer, VP for Global Engagement & Operations at TAG. “In today’s complicated supply chain, advertisers and their agencies can be unaware that some of their inventory is ending up on pirate sites, thus driving illegal activity and enriching criminals. This report found that the vast majority of advertisers that TAG contacted took action to protect their ad budgets and their brands when they were alerted to such misplacements.”

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