Revelations of brand advertising appearing next to extremist and unsavoury content on YouTube this year rocked the advertising world. The repercussions were substantial, with many of the world's largest brands – including Pepsi, Starbucks and Walmart – leading a mass boycott of Google following these events.
This prominent case of programmatic advertising gone awry has shone a light on the issue of brand safety, which is now more than ever at the forefront in the minds of marketers, brand owners and agencies. Indeed, new research from the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA) (which represents most big advertisers) found that 74%...