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According to the survey, 97% of influencers published posts with commercial content, but only 20% systematically disclosed it as advertising
Extensive research on influencers in the biggest social media, carried out by the European Commissionand the national consumer protection authorities of 22 Member States, Norway and Iceland, which revealed that only one in five disclose their advertising activities as required by EU law.
According to the survey, 97% of influencers posted with commercial content, but only 20% systematically disclosed it as advertising. 78% were trading, however, only 36% were registered as merchants nationally. 30% of influencers polled did not provide company information in their posts, such as e-mail address, company name, postal address or number registration; 38% of them did not use the platform tags used to disclose commercial content, such as the “paid partnership” toggleon Instagram, instead, they chose different wording, such as “collaboration” (16%), “partnership” (15%) or general thanks to the partner brand (11%).
40% of influencers did the disclosure visible during the entire commercial communication. 34% made the disclosure immediately visible without requiring additional steps such as clicking “read more” or scrolling 40% of influencers endorsed their own products, services or brands. 60% of them did not consistently disclose, or hid the ads, while 44% of the influencers had their own websites, through which the majority were able to sell products directly.
As a result of the business « broom”, 358 influencers will be subject to further investigation. National authorities will contact them to ask them to follow the current rules. Further enforcement action may be taken if necessary, in accordance with national procedures.
The Commission will analyze the results of the investigation and in the light of the legal obligations of the platforms will take the necessary measures, depending on the case.
During the operations are checked 82 influencers who had more than 1 million followers, 301 , with more than 100,000 and 73 between 5,000 and 100,000.
Several influencers were active on different social media platforms: 572 had posts on Instagram, 334 on TikTok, 224 on YouTube, 202 on Facebook, 82 on X (formerly Twitter), 52 on Snapchat and 28 on Twitch.
The main areas of activity for them are, in descending order, fashion, lifestyle, beauty, food, travel and fitness/sports. 119 influencers were deemed to promote unhealthy or dangerous activities, such as junk food, alcoholic beverages, medical or aesthetic treatments, gambling or financial services such as cryptocurrencies.
Source: newmoney.gr
