Breaking: Google Removing All Ads Around Referendum Over "Election Integrity" Concerns
Google has announced that it is to ban all advertising related to the upcoming referendum on its platforms, including YouTube.
The decision comes in the wake of Facebook's announcement yesterday that they would similarly be banning all ads pertaining to the referendum from their platforms.
However, whereas Facebook were banning ads from companies outside the state, as there have been concerns of American lobbyists helping to fund advertisements for the No side of the campaign, Google will be prohibiting all forms of advertising related to the referendum on their sites.
A spokesperson for Google said that, "Following our update around election integrity efforts globally, we have decided to pause all ads related to the Irish referendum on the Eighth Amendment." The decision is from a similar motive to Facebook's - a fear of the integrity of the referendum being compromised by extra-national intervention through internet advertising, however with the referendum so soon and systematically regulating the sources of advertisement funding naturally proving a difficult and complex process they have taken the decision to ban all advertising outright.
There reticence around this stems from the fact that electoral laws here prohibit groups campaigning in referendums to receive funding from bodies outside the state, however, no legislation currently exists extending this to social media groups and online media companies from utilising advertising and funding from groups outside the state.
This will remove showing up on Google searches relating to the referendum as well as advertisements on YouTube, however it will have no impact on Google search results. The changes are expected to take effect within 24 hours.
H/T: RTE.ie