Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of fraud on the open display advertising market, and what action they plan to take to address it.

In 2022, DCMS consulted on the effectiveness of the self-regulatory framework for paid-for online advertising, with responses providing insight on a range of online advertising harms, including fraud. Alongside the consultation, research commissioned from independent digital media consultancy, Spark Ninety, analysed online advertising harms, the online advertising market and regulatory landscape. This included an overview of the open display advertising market and its associated supply chain and harms, including fraudulent advertising.

In addition to the fraudulent advertising duty in the Online Safety Act, the Online Advertising Taskforce, which brings together government and industry, was set up to help address these issues. The Taskforce aims to ensure the UK online advertising industry can grow sustainably while providing the necessary protections for consumers. It is working towards improving transparency, accountability and trust in the online advertising supply chain, continuing to build the evidence base and delivering a programme of work to help address fraudulent and other illegal advertising. It is also working to increase protections against children being served advertising for products and services that may not lawfully be sold to them.

In our manifesto the Government also committed to introducing an expanded Fraud Strategy, covering the continued and modern-day threats our society faces. Development of the strategy has begun and we are considering all harms, including fraudulent online advertising.