Good news for the gambling industry in ASA’s second online monitoring sweep

The Advertising Standards Authority has today (20 November 2020) reported that the second of its online monitoring sweeps to identify and tackle age-restricted ads appearing in children’s media has “encouragingly” revealed that:

……. the number of gambling ads reduced significantly, from 70 ads in the first sweep to 5 ads in the second sweep. Significantlynone of the gambling operators contacted during the national lockdown were found to have broken the rules during this latest monitoring exercise.

As many gambling operators had already been contacted before this project began and therefore had more time to ensure their ads were targeted away from children, we hope to see this trend mirrored in other sectors in the third report next year, as advertisers will, by then, have had a similar amount of time to amend their practices.

This follows the ASA’s first such sweep, the outcome of which was reported by us in August 2020.

Commenting on this second sweep, ASA Chief Executive, Guy Parker has said:

We’re encouraged to see advertisers, most notably in the gambling sector, taking steps to target their age-restricted online ads responsibly. We expect that trend to continue, particularly amongst HFSS advertisers, throughout the remainder of this project and beyond. We’ll continue working with advertisers and taking action where necessary to build a culture of zero tolerance for age-restricted ads appearing on websites aimed at children.

You can download below the ASA’s full report following this second sweep.