Concerns over EU political ad transparency rules before local elections
With less than two months to go until both the arrival of a new European Union regulation on political advertising transparency and local elections in Estonia, some leaders have reported a lack of clarity on implementing these regulations and their effects.
The EU's Transparency and Targeting of Political Advertising (TTPA) regulation enters into force on October 10, just nine days before local elections polling day in Estonia. This makes Estonia the first EU member state to hold elections after the regulation, which addresses disinformation surrounding elections in EU member states, enters force.
The new rules require political advertising to be accompanied by a transparency notice providing information about the advertiser and the related event.
Further complications have arisen with some of the major social media providers including Google, Meta and TikTok announcing they are banning political advertising on their platforms in light of the new regulations.
Media houses in Estonia had said in spring most of the political campaigning advertising would move to social media due to fear of large fines which might have arisen from violating the regulations.
Väino Koorberg, CEO of the Estonian Media Association, said he "does not see a good outcome; I see a bad outcome in the sense that elections as a phenomenon and political competition before the elections disappears somewhere and becomes invisible."
"An election contest is also part of democracy, and if it becomes invisible because a large part of it is prohibited or driven underground out of fear, then that is not good for democracy," Koorberg went on.
Minister of Justice and Digital Affairs Liisa Pakosta too is critical towards the incoming regulations.
"First of all, it has to be stressed that Estonia has opposed this regulation as it does not solve the real issue. The real issue is, how can we reduce Russia's influence operations on democratic elections, including on Estonian elections. In our view, this political advertising transparency thing does not resolve that," Pakosta said.
Some advertising creators remain more calm about the situation, however, noting that other types of advertisement must
Urmas Villmann, creative director of ad agency Kontuur, said: "This is not news, because in other fields there are also various regulations. For example, when there is an advertisement for financial institutions, then that must state who issues it and what the interest rate is. In the same way, it is not news that hard liquor advertising is prohibited entirely, and neither is this news with [the ban on] gambling advertising."
Estonia does not plan to rush into punishing violators of the new EU regulations either, Pakosta said, and will instead aim to provide guidance and information.
"Our goal in the Estonian state is not to start mass monitoring and fining. The prime goal is still to advise and inform. There are also guidelines available for everyone on the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Digital Affairs websites," Pakosta said.
Meta plans to ban political, electoral, and social issue ads on its platforms starting in early October, just ahead of the TTPA coming into force. Several recent EU elections have been targeted by disinformation. In December, Romania became the first member state to annul an election, in this case a presidential election, due to foreign interference via social media.
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Editor: Andrew Whyte, Marko Tooming
