Australian publishers have reacted to the interim report from competition watchdog ACCC about the digital advertising services inquiry.
News Corp Australasia executive chairman Michael Miller: "The ACCC's interim report shines a light on Google's pervasive commercial power that impacts the entire Australian economy not just the publishing industry."
Dan Stinton, managing director, The Guardian: "The ACCC has done an excellent job uncovering the two main issues in the supply of digital advertising - namely the opacity of the digital supply chain and complete dominance of Google throughout.
"Clearly Google needs to be restricted from exploiting its market power to preference its own business and the market needs to operate with more transparency to give consumers, advertisers and publishers more confidence in the way it operates.
"It is essential, however, that this is done in concert with a substantial overhaul of our woefully inadequate privacy regulations to put appropriate guardrails on the ubiquitous collection and use of consumer data."
Free TV CEO Bridget Fair: “We are very pleased that the ACCC has recognised the concerns we have raised about inefficiencies and lack of choice in the ad tech market.
“We strongly support the ACCC’s proposed measures to allow advertisers and publishers to choose their own ad tech suppliers and to improve transparency measures. This will deliver more competition into the market and importantly ensure that advertisers know where their money is going.
“With less money wasted in the system, more money will be available for Free TV broadcasters and other content creators to continue to invest in great local programming and trusted news.
“In submissions to the ACCC since 2017, Free TV has been calling for new rules to govern the ad tech market, specifically to ensure that Google does not preference its own products and that auctions processes are fair and transparent. We very much welcome the fact that the ACCC has included this proposal in its interim report.
“The ACCC report is consistent with actions being taken around the world to support an open and transparent ad tech market. We look forward to working with the ACCC as it finalises its advice to Government by August 2021."
Google says it has been engaged constructively with the ACCC and will continue to do so as the inquiry continues.
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