Dive Brief:
- Adblock Plus parent Eyeo GmbH announced it will use an independent review board to determine which ads can pass through the software’s blocking filters.
- Ads from about 700 companies currently make it through if they meet Adblock Plus standards and are judged to be unintrusive.
- The company takes payments from about 10% of the advertisers it deems acceptable, including Google, Microsoft, and content monetization platform Taboola.
Dive Insight:
Eyeo GMBH is forming an independent board of representatives from media companies, marketers, agencies, and consumers to decide which ads are acceptable for its Adblock Plus blocking software to let though. The company has faced criticism from the digital media for taking payments from companies whose ads the software “whitelists.” The board will convene in the first half of 2016, the company says.
Presently, Adblock dictates that ads shouldn’t annoy or disrupt content, and should be appropriate to their sites and transparent about being paid placements, among other requirements set by web users early in its history. The board will update the criteria independently of payment, the company says.
Ad-blocking tools are holding revenues “hostage,” Scott Cunningham, general manager of the Interactive Advertising Bureau Technology Lab, said in a press conference held during Advertising Week in New York yesterday. Apple’s move to enable ad blocking on the latest version of its mobile iOS has created a firestorm in the advertising industry over the last month, as well as a boom in software offerings.