In a rare spat among industry trade groups, CEOs of the Association of National Advertisers and 4A’s, the leading bodies representing U.S. marketers and ad agencies, issued a joint statement today criticizing IAB CEO David Cohen for his tone, wording and some of the substance of a speech he made last week against privacy-focused critics of the digital media industry.
Cohen, whose group primarily represents digital publishers and ad tech players including Google and Meta, criticized Apple alleging “hypocrisy” over privacy policies that he said have cost digital publishers $6.5 billion in revenue. And he labeled government and other critics of the industry “extremists.”
“While there is no shortage of extremists attacking our industry from the outside, there are some attacking it from the inside out,” Cohen said last week at IAB’s annual leadership meeting. “Most notably, Apple exemplifies the cynicism and hypocrisy that underpins the prevailing extremist view.”
The joint ANA and 4A’s statement suggests that when it comes to privacy and other regulatory issues, the buy side of the ad industry doesn’t want to be lumped in with the sell side—particularly not Cohen or big tech players such as Google and Meta that have been under attack by legislators and, in the case of Google, by the Justice Department in an anti-trust complaint filed last week.
“In an era of inflamed political tensions and growing division, the art of nuance and listening is quickly jettisoned for the short-term sugar highs of polarizing political rhetoric,” according to a joint statement by ANA CEO Bob Liodice and 4A’s CEO Marla Kaplowitz. “And while polarizing political rhetoric might produce short-term results, it does nothing to achieve the kind of balanced, lasting consensus needed to effectuate real solutions.”
“The 4A’s and ANA reject the acerbic tone, texture and prescriptions offered by the IAB,” the statement continued. “Our industry was built on a foundation of responsible marketing. While we, as an industry, may not always get it right, we do know when we must lead to restore balance— especially when we have created the conditions for our industry to be ‘out of balance.’”
The groups pointed to self-regulatory efforts such as creation of the Media Rating Council, Children’s Food and Advertising Initiative and Digital Advertising Alliance as joint industry efforts to deal with issues the industry has faced, as well as to pushes by advertisers to improve brand safety and fight digital ad fraud.
“Our industry is far from perfect,” said the joint statement. “Many of the problems that the IAB cited were because of an imbalanced industry that we all created and supported with our advertising investments. Did we ever utter the issues of ‘brand safety’ or ‘digital ad fraud’ 10 years ago? Of course not. But it is time for our industry to clean up its messes and present a far more responsible approach to address the issues that are prevalent in our industry.”
Related: Apple’s privacy policies under fire from ad tech industry
Besides Apple, which Cohen criticized for making money on personalized ads it controls while making it harder for other players in the name of privacy safeguards, he also specifically called out by name a number of academics, regulators and Congressional critics.
“Washington D.C. leaders including [Sen.] Amy Klobuchar [D-Minnesota] and [Sen.] Ted Cruz [R-Texas] will throw our industry under their campaign buses, if we let them,” Cohen said, according to a transcript.
The ANA and 4A’s statement didn’t specifically come to the defense of Apple or any other industry critic named by Cohen. But it said, “Privacy is not a ‘war’ to be won or a ‘battle’ against extremists. Privacy is a complex, multi-layered issue experienced both broadly and narrowly by a complex array of actors. Its evolution as a prominent societal issue in the last decade has come with a complex array of challenges for the advertising and marketing industry.”
Later on Tuesday, Cohen responded to the groups’ statement.
“Rather than be divisive, the goal of my opening keynote was to rally the industry and instill a sense of urgency so that we can work together to build a healthy and sustainable ad-supported digital industry,” Cohen said in a statement. “It was also to accurately reflect the interests of our members which now include all sides of the digital ecosystem. We have deep respect for Congress and appreciate all the work going towards national privacy reform. However, we need to recognize that there is a perception issue that we need to overcome. The negativity around the technology sector fueled by select viewpoints has the potential to adversely impact us all. The industry must all work collaboratively to ensure we get a rational and sound national policy on data use. We look forward to working with legislators and regulators as well as the ANA, 4A’s and others over the coming months to develop solutions that work for all constituents: consumers, regulators, and industry.”
This story has been updated to include comments from IAB CEO David Cohen.
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