UK places crypto advertisements under “Red Alert”
Moving forward, the United Kingdom Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) will scrutinize all marketing related to cryptocurrencies, especially on social media.
Amid the U.K.’s seemingly harder stance on crypto regulations stance on the cryptocurrency business, authorities are planning to launch an effort this month to hunt and shut down deceptive crypto adverts.
ASA, the U.K. advertising industry’s watchdog, is spearheading efforts to regulate cryptocurrency ads. According to a report by the Financial Times, Miles Lockwood, ASA’s director of complaints, said the authority would particularly target irresponsible crypto ads being spread online and on social media platforms. He added:
We see this as an absolutely crucial and priority area for us. Where we find trouble, we will crack down hard and quickly.
Most crypto investments fall outside the scope of the UK’s strict rules for promoting traditional financial products, which are supervised by the Financial Conduct Authority. ASA is increasing its capacity to track bogus crypto ads using Artificial Intelligence (AI) and scraping.
Defaulting companies will be issued warnings and may be required to add disclaimers to their advertisements. Already a Bitcoin poster sponsored by cryptocurrency exchange Luno was taken down by ASA in May.
