The World Federation of Advertisers is in retreat after a legal challenge by billionaire Elon Musk, and increasing voices of protest by publishers, including News Corp, to the activities of the Global Alliance for Responsible Media
Multiple reports quoted an internal email from Stephan Loerke, the CEO of the World Federation of Advertisers the organisation would be “discontinuing all GARM activities with immediate effect”.
“We take this matter very seriously indeed and intend to rebut these allegations in court,” Loerke said.
Musk is taking the advertisers to court alleging they unlawfully boycotted his social media platform X, formerly Twitter.
The antitrust lawsuit takes aim at GARM, the World Federation of Advertisers, and GARM members CVS Health, Mars, Orsted and Unilever for “coercive exercise of market power”.
Advertisers did withdraw, over concerns for brand safety, from then Twitter when Musk took the platform private in 2022 and said he would champion free speech by easing content restrictions.
The US House of Representatives Judiciary Committee found evidence that GARM and its members directly “organised boycotts and used other indirect tactics to target disfavored platforms, content creators, and news organisations in an effort to demonetise and, in effect, limit certain choices for consumers”.
Linda Yaccarino, CEO of X Corp, said the illegal behavior of these organisations and their executives cost X billions of dollars.
Robert Thomson, CEO of News Corp, is also considering action against GARM.
"We are also considering our legal options in confronting the blatant political bias of advertising industry bodies who have done serious damage and denied many advertisers access to a significant audience," he told market analysts in a briefing.
"We applaud the work of the US House Judiciary Committee in pursuing the misnomer that is the Global Alliance for Responsible Media ... and its coordinated boycott of media platforms perceived to be unfashionable by illiberal liberals.
"Garm, harm has been real, and there need to be commercial consequences."
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