Singapore – The Ministry of Digital Development and Information (MDDI) has recently announced the introduction of the Elections (Integrity of Online Advertising) (Amendment) Bill, which seeks to introduce new legal measures to uphold integrity of online advertising during elections, as well as aiming to safeguard the integrity and truthfulness of representation during elections.

The bill was introduced to the Singapore Parliament on September, and seeks to amend the Parliamentary Elections Act 1954 (PEA) and the Presidential Elections Act 1991 (PrEA) to introduce new safeguards related to online advertising.

According to MDDI, the bill seeks to introduce new measures to protect Singaporeans from digitally manipulated content during elections, including artificial intelligence (AI)-generated misinformation, commonly known as deepfakes.

“In Singapore, we have observed a worrying trend of malicious deepfakes, including those used for scams and extortion. Deepfakes are a particularly concerning form of misinformation because they can realistically depict the appearance, voice, or action of an individual in a manner which can deceive or mislead the public,” MDDI said in a press statement.

It is worth noting that while the government can already deal with individual pieces of online falsehoods against the public interest through the Protection from Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act (POFMA), targeted levers are needed under the country’s Online Election Advertising (OEA) regime to act on deepfakes that misrepresent candidates during elections. 

“Such content, if left unaddressed, can threaten the integrity of our electoral process. Voters must be able to make informed choices based on facts and not misinformation,” the ministry said.

Moreover, the bill proposes to prohibit the publication of digitally generated or manipulated OEA that realistically depicts a candidate saying or doing something that he or she did not in fact say or do. This prohibition will only apply to OEA depicting persons who are running as candidates for an election.

MDDI also stated that the Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) will introduce a new Code of Practice requiring specified social media services to put in place measures to prevent and counter the abuse of digitally manipulated content on their service(s). IMDA will engage social media services in the coming months to work out the details of the code.

Singapore Integral Ad Science (IAS), the global media measurement and optimization platform, has announced an expansion of its measurement capabilities on YouTube. 

Through this, the business will introduce its industry brand safety and suitability measurement tool to advertisers for YouTube Shorts inventory, integrating it into the full Total Media Quality for YouTube product suite.

The Global Alliance for Responsible Media (GARM) framework’s video-level transparency standards and adjacency standards will be upheld by IAS, which will provide brands with improved third-party assurance that their YouTube Shorts video ads are in line with appropriate and brand-safe content.

Total Media Quality for YouTube, within the scope of standards, gives advertisers access to brand safety and suitability indicators for impressions served on YouTube Shorts. This includes viewability and invalid traffic measurement on a global scale, as well as support for over 30 languages.

Additionally, an analytics dashboard specifically designed for YouTube advertisers is also introduced by IAS as part of its Brand Safety and Suitability evaluation. With the help of this tool, advertisers may create a customised suitability profile and examine trends in brand safety and compatibility through informative charts.

Speaking about the expansion, Lisa Utzschneider, CEO of IAS, said, “Since IAS launched Total Media Quality for YouTube earlier this year, we’ve been able to provide new levels of insight into video content for advertisers through our advanced AI-driven technology and expanded reporting capabilities.”

“With this expansion of our measurement capabilities on YouTube, we can bring marketers the most actionable data to maximise their safety on YouTube Shorts inventory – one of the fastest growing video formats in digital advertising,” she added. 

Singapore – Online advertising has continued to grow despite the challenging economic conditions, reaching $3.732b for the Q3 2023, according to data which was drawn from the IAB Australia Online Advertising Expenditure Report (OAER) prepared by PwC, showing how online advertising increased by 7.8% year-on-year and 2.1% over the preceding quarter.

Specifically, the data suggests that total expenditure by category in Q3 2023 quarter was $1.630b for search and directories, $1.451b for general display and $649.2m for classifieds. 

Furthermore, general display advertising increased 2.7% over the June 2023 quarter and 8% year-on-year from the September 2022 quarter. Search and directories also softened by 1.6% from June 2023 but increased 10.6% year-on-year from September 2022.

Within general display advertising, audio advertising expenditure recorded no growth quarter over the June quarter reaching $68m for the September quarter, but it increased 16.2% year-on-year from September 2022. Video advertising recorded a 5% growth quarter-on-quarter to reach $968.1m for the September quarter and 15% growth year-on-year from September 2022.

Additionally, the retail, automotive, and health & beauty sectors all reported strong growth in Q3 2023, with retail reaching 17.1% share of general display advertising, automotive increasing to 15.4% and health and beauty reaching 7.9%. Finance (8.7%) and FMCG (5.7%) remain in the top five industry categories for expenditure.

Lastly, connected TV continues to yield the greatest share of content publisher’s video inventory investment, increasing from 45% in Q2 2023 to 54% in Q3 2023 buoyed in part by Women’s Football World Cup activity. Desktop reduced from 38% to 25% in the same period, while mobile investment increased from 17% to 21%.

Talking about these results, Gai Le Roy, CEO of IAB Australia, commented, “It is encouraging to see marketers continue to invest in advertising to drive growth. However, investment in different media environments was not universal and the market was tough for many organisations.” 

“Retail continues to be the number one advertiser category with investment from local and global retailers. It is also pleasing to see the uplift in automotive advertising with the share of spend in the general display category above 15% for the first time since September 2020,” she added.