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FTC Demands Search Engines Separate Paid Advertisements From Search Results
An anonymous reader notes that the FTC has sent letters to search engine companies (PDF) telling them to make sure advertisements are clearly distinguishable from search results.
"According to both the FTC staff's original search engine guidance and the updated guidance, failing to clearly and prominently distinguish advertising from natural search results could be a deceptive practice. The updated guidance emphasizes the need for visual cues, labels, or other techniques to effectively distinguish advertisements, in order to avoid misleading consumers, and it makes recommendations for ensuring that disclosures commonly used to identify advertising are noticeable and understandable to consumers. The letters note that the principles of the original guidance still apply, even as search and the business of search continue to evolve. The letters observe that social media, mobile apps, voice assistants on mobile devices, and specialized search results that are integrated into general search results offer consumers new ways of getting information. The guidance advises that regardless of the precise form that search takes now or in the future, paid search results and other forms of advertising should be clearly distinguishable from natural search results."
Google never indicated, to me at least, what was in the search results. I don't see how it could be deceptive.
And even if it was, does that matter, since I don't pay Google one red cent for the service?
Wait, the FTC got there before the EU?
I especially dislike Google's 'light pink' sponsored links that not every screen would render in a different color. There is no way this isn't intentional.
I might not notice the ads are trying to sell me targlferfs instead. I could easily buy the wrong thing because, as an average consumer, I'm a complete idiot!
Hey, this looks like just another white wash of the whole online space by the FTC. They fail to enforce a variety of rules then come up with a smokescreen one like this story highlights. Sure the FTC is supposed to watch out. But in this case, it is a non-problem, also known as a 'red herring' on their part.
http://www.aisnota.com/slashdot/ Welcome to Logic and the Future
Hmm.. how do they think search engine make money ? Now another government entity muddling into shit where they have no knowledge.
sometimes the ads are related to my search and helpful Other time I just ignore them. Bug deal this is one of the ways Google, Bing, and Ask.com make money.
the last thing I want is a government subsidized search engine.
Ouch. This is going to leave a mark. (Not that I'm unhappy about it.)
What pisses me off is scam artists using paid search ads for common open source software. Google for Open Office or 7-zip or VLC and the top paid ranks will redirect you to scams. Some try to charge you, others wrap the software you want in an installer that plants malware on your system. (If you're lucky. Often you can find worse)
Of course they could not get away with this targeting a for-profit company(They'd get sued in to the ground) but targeting free/open source/volunteer projects just disgusts me beyond words.
I wish Google would pay more attention to this.
I've never had an issue distinguishing search results from ads/sponsored results on any search engine. How about we crack down on commercials that try to pass themselves off as a news segment to get grandma's precious retirement money.
If only the laws Congress passed were clearly notified with their sponsors, This Corporation or That Union.
But that would be addressing an issue at least 5 orders of magnitude bigger.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
not just search engine results, but identify them from even a website's local content. how many times have you gone to a site to download a file and had to figure out which button was the real download button?
You mean setting the advertisement background color to #fefefe instead of #ffffff isn't good enough for the Feds?
That requirement sounds reasonable. Google used to work that way: you had highlighted boxes at the top and on the right that contained the paid placements, and the unhighlighted regular search results in the body of the page. There's no technical reason it can't be done that way now. Lots of business reasons maybe, but no technical ones which is all the FTC should be caring about.
That doesn't mean the FTC should be unreasonably interfering in a search engines' business. But saying the search engine has to clearly indicate which results it's being paid to show people is hardly unreasonable.
Only thing it has served is to find the really truly babe in the woods who walk into a dealership without knowing even this fictional "invoice" price. You can hear the champagne corks popping when someone starts negotiating from the X below MSRP instead of Y above invoice.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Deceptive? Has the FTC watched any TV commercials recently? Commercials are contradictory, with video sending one message and unreadable fine print sending another.
He established the FTC in 1914 for "antitrust" purposes, and now these assholes are dictating web page design to google? Is there anything the government feels is outside of their absolute power to control?
These are the same guys that operate on the following logic:
* IF you are charging more than your competitors THEN guilty of price-gouging
* IF you are charging less than your competitors THEN guilty of predatory pricing
* IF you are charging the same as your competitors THEN guilty of price collusion
Can we all just succeed already and let the Federal monster die of starvation?
Though it's been quite stellar for years, ever since the DoubleClick acquisition, Google's DNA has become more spammy [1]. Not that Bing is any saint [2], and Microsoft has it's sordid history with not showing "linux" search results (before Bing days).
This kind of intervention from big bad government might do something to keep the search engines from devolving into glorified billboards.
[1] http://www.businessinsider.com/google-is-blurring-the-lines-between-ads-and-search-results-2012-4
[2] http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/02/microsofts-bing-uses-google-search.html
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FTC is unconstitutional and has no authority over this.
Google and other ads are specifically designed to look like search results and exploit the fact that older people cannot see contrast of the background as well as younger people. Or even younger people using bad quality or badly calibrated monitors. (Or using Flux).
The contrast on the background is much lower than the federal 508 standard for contrast and I think has changed to over the years to a lighter shade as Google "optimizes" it.
http://i.imgur.com/Wmdd0.png
One is an ad and one is a search result, is there much difference? Given the average quality of monitors, I think those are designed to fool even otherwise sharp eyes.
There is a border on the right of the ads but none on at the bottom. Google must be getting tens or even hundreds of millions of dollars of revenue from the color change from blue to yellow, the ones shown in the example are about $50 to $100 for each click.
http://ppcblog.com/fbf0fa-now-you-see-it
http://blumenthals.com/blog/2012/01/31/is-google-intentionally-trying-to-minimize-the-fact-that-these-are-ads/
Guess they employ many behavioral psychologist super PHDs who tweaked the carefully and scientifically calibrated colors on ads and removed all contrast including borders to make many folks not realize where the ads end and the actual results begin. Forget about people going to paid websites and screwing websites that don't charge users that rank well organically because they're good and popular but don't give the Googolplex any money.
"Study:Contrast sensitivity gradually decreases with age"
http://www.eyeworld.org/article.php?sid=818&strict=0&morphologic=0
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Do some/many/all search engines make any promises that results will be unbiased? I'm not sure they do and if they don't, who is the FTC to step in and force them to make them so? I think all that Google promises is to give you results based on your query terms. Why shouldn't they be allowed to throw ads in?
Ultimately, if the ads are tainting the results too much, people will find better search engines and Google (or whichever search engine you want to substitute) will die. In case the FTC doesn't know, that's called "the free market".
below the line fees from service businesses such as cable and cellular? That is blatant false advertising and you pricks don't give two shits about it.
"99 bucks a month for unlimited talk, text and data" my left nut! With taxes and fees its over 20% more than that at least.
Also eliminate unliimited from advertising, its not unlimited, its either rate or speed limited pretty much everywhere now.
Then, THEN you can work on sponsored links mixed in among actual search results. Dicks.
Given that this isn't being broadcast in a one to many network, and that it's not interfering with communication infrastructure, why does the FCC have authority to do something like this?
Google and other ads are specifically designed to look like search results and exploit the fact that older people cannot see contrast of the background as well as younger people. Or even younger people using bad quality or badly calibrated monitors
I was reading their corporate motto "Do no evil" on their site, and then I saw your post and upped the contrast on my monitor and then saw the entire text that was hidden earlier, "Do no evil - except when it makes us money. In that case, be very very evil." !
You and the FTC must really be on to be something here!!!
This space for rent.
Google became popular because they were plan, without real ads. Now that they are going away from that, someone else will pop up and take their place soon enough. And then Google will either back off cause they are in danger of losing their user base, or they will go the way of MS Search, Yahoo, etc and fall into use by old fogeys who are just too stubborn to change.
I actually think that, when it comes to regulating Internet or media companies, nothing could be more important than this.
This is the ultimate line in the sand for an advertising company (or a consumer of ads). I'm generally a defender of Google, but if they were to cross this line then - for the first time - I would think they have truly become the evil that they disavowed in their inception.
And this is about the Internet in general. We need to know whether content is paid or not if we are to preserve a space for the the unpaid. Otherwise, the paid opinion will always win out since it has the money to promote itself.
whoever upmodded you needs to go back and read too. Its the FTC not the FCC, Federal Trade Commission. And they do indeed have the authority to do something like this as it is about business advertising.
They still need to admonish businesses using below the line fees to jack up their prices before worrying about how google and other search engines advertise.
Google ads are easier to recognize than "sponsored posts" one finds in Facebook or Twitter feeds.
It would appear that Google has never taken money to improve/change search results, and paid ads are already distinguished from search results. I don't know the status of other search engines.
https://www.google.com/competition/howgoogleadswork.html#section2
Fantastic news for me. I hold two lucrative patents. One for rendering advertising distinguishable from search results on a computer. The other one for rendering advertising distinguishable from search results on a mobile device.
Now I lie and wait for 15 years before I act.
I am trying to understand how this is different from the FTC's rule that you don't print advertisements in magazines that look like regular editorial content.
Other than "...on a computer!" of course.
What ticks me off about search is the number of hits that lead one to yet another search engine.
If I didn't have absolutely NOTHING to do, I wouldn't be here.
Don't you feel great about the fact that YOU are busting your ass so that the federal government can over-pay a bunch of useless bureaucrats to conduct studies and domineer over search services?
Tell you what feds, quit stealing from me and I'll figure out how to avoid the horrible perils of advertisements in my search results on my own.
As much as I hate advertisements, I hate the idea of government control even more.
This is nothing other than government trying to get a little more control over something. I say give them NOTHING.
The color shows up just fine.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
I have never cared for flat monitors, are they really so bad you can't tell the difference between those? Looks ok to me but could use a border for clarity...assuming clarity is desired ;)
You probably can't see a diference in Bing at all then. Ad section is a slightly greenish background. Way too subtle IMHO.
Bing does have a light border at the right edge. If one tried to print the results page however that light border on one side wins over Google's VERY light border.
Both seem pretty borderline..... also the cure ;)
Bing-it-on....
lol, for all the advertising by Bing lately from the search box at least both result pages look nearly identical. Bing has one more ad and pushes the images a little higher up the page. Bing displayed 5 pic vs Google with 4, but the 4 had better variety.
Physicians for decades now have been allowed to take money from drug manufacturers and prescribe those drugs to patients without informing those patients that a cheaper or a generic drug is just as effective. No federal agency (FTC, FDA, FBI) or professional organization (ie AMA) has stepped in to even investigate this common practice.
Advertising in the doctor's office office has been soaring, with posters on the wall and flyers handed to patients hawking everything from prescription drugs and vitamins to therapeutic procedures and cosmetic surgery. You can no longer tell when a physician is offering genuine medical advice or trying to upsell you to something you don't need that could potentially cause harm from the side effects.
I chose to change doctors last year when I noticed pharma reps, with their suits and rolling breifcases, coming in and out of the office more than the patients were.
You have made multiple posts with the same content but it's hard for us to understand without screenshots since search results are personalized and localized.
To me Bing is clearer because they have a border on the right extending till the ad, and Google doesn't.
Otherwise, the paid opinion will always win out since it has the money to promote itself.
Not necessarily.
The Internet is a billion voices, with no controlling authority. It's too expensive to pay off more than a tiny percentage of those voices. In the end, that's the one and only thing that makes it possible to use the Internet to obtain truthful information.
Whenever I read something, I google the source to get a feeling for how trustworthy it is. The consensus of the community then allows me to decide whether it's likely true, or likely marketing lies. Of course, this requires me to be alert to SEO-skewed results and astroturfing and so forth, but that's just part of the basic literacy that people need to have when they use the Internet for research.
There is only one possible solution here: The communal tracking of the trustworthiness of the voices on the Internet. Relying on the FTC to police the Internet is idiotic.
People can click the ad, or the can click the SEO-optimized link that appears immediately after the ad.
Either way, they get an ad.
As a practical matter, the background color of the link is irrelevant. It's useless to rely on the FTC to police this.
Anyone using the Internet for research will first encounter ads, and they must search deeper to cut through that clutter. That's part of basic Internet literacy.
You mean you are looking for differences beyond the fact that Google is not the one creating the editorial content and are simply pointing you to someone else's content? I'm not sure there are other differences beyond the only one that matters.
Google created a color tan that very, very easily disappears at any screen with a remotely poor viewing angle. It's a very unique color that web designers specifically know not to use for that exact reason. That's why incredibly stupid people keep clicking on the results or even reading or considering them after doing a google search. They always claim they can't see the box and can't tell the difference.
Can't see them, and that's not because of my poor vision...
In fact anytime I use a browser without AdBlock and NoScript, I can't believe anyone would choose to suffer like that.
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