The online advertising industry is rife with fraud, perhaps because it’s dominated by big tech and perhaps despite it. Either way, ads.txt is one of the more effective measures at limiting the problem. But this study by Sellers.Guide found errors in tens of thousands of ads.txt files, although the report doesn’t indicate what fraction of the total that represents.
The EU has completed passage of its Digital Services Act with final approval by the European Council. The act targets unfair practices by big tech vendors. Contrast that to the big U.S. antitrust bill that’s stalled in the U.S. Senate. (Thanks, Chuck Schumer.) Don’t confuse it with a much smaller bill approved by the House last week.
In somewhat cheerier news, Spiceworks Ziff Davis reports that most companies (51%) plan to increase IT spending next year, even those even more (83%) are worried about a recession. Unfortunately for many marketers, the focus of spending will be infrastructure improvements not marketing. If you want a clearer sense of IT priorities: personalized advertising ranks second-to-last on a list of ten ways organizations plan to use artificial intelligence.
The U.S. Department of Justice has formally requested the sale of the Chrome browser among other measures following last August’s guilty verdict in its search advertising antitrust suit (not to be confused with last week’s guilty verdict in the adtech antitrust lawsuit). Google is asking for a much narrower focus on deals to be the default search engine for Apple, Mozilla and others. There will be a three-week hearing on the government’s proposals.