Effectiveness of Political Ad Disclosure Labels and the DSA proposal

Natali Helberger, Tom Dobber and Sanne Kruikemeier, together with Ellen Goodman and Sophie Minihold, tested the effectiveness of political ad disclosure labels.

Online political advertisements are often opaque with respect to targeting and sponsorship. Citizens may not know that they are seeing a targeted political advertisement, that they were
personally targeted, that the audience may be very small, or even who has sponsored the ad. As a result, people are not optimally equipped to interpret and contextualize online political ads. In an effort to empower citizens and to increase advertiser accountability, lawmakers are demanding more advertising transparency through the use of labels and other forms of disclosure for online political advertisements.

Read the summary of the ‘Transparency research” here.