Regulators in UK Are Raising Voices About Google’s Unfair Ad Tech Practices that Are Giving a Hard Time To Competitors

Competition regulators in the UK have objected to Google’s ad tech practices that are affecting the competition in the UK. The British Competition and Marketing authority has released a statement saying that Google has impacted the competition in the search market by advertising their own services favoring themselves. According to CMA, many marketers and publishers in the UK bid and sell to Google to advertise in the market. In 2019, these marketers and publishers gave £1.8 billion annually to use Google’s technology for advertising.

The British regulators also said that Google is misusing its dominance in the market to advertise its own services. CMA also said that Google isn’t giving a fair field to many competitors which is disadvantageous to many ad technologies. Interim executive director of enforcement at the CMA, Juliette Enser, says that through ads, many businesses and websites are keeping their platform free. They are earning millions of revenue from these ads and when these ads reach millions of people in the UK, a lot of goods and services get bought or sold out. That’s why it is important that all publishers and advertisers experience fair competition as they are keeping most of their content free.

The vice president of Google ads, Dan Taylor, says that Google completely disagrees with CMA views and will soon respond in accordance with that. Taylor wrote an email which said that Google is fair to all types of content and their advertising technology is helping millions of websites earn revenue and reach customers. Google aims to create value for advertisers and publishers in a competitive setting and all the things that have been said about Google ads are flawed.

It is worth mentioning here that this isn’t the first time that Google ads have been accused of abusing its power in ad tech. Last year, European Union regulators also charged Google with breaching antitrust rules about ad tech. They said that Google has always been dominating search and text advertising for years. This accusation on Google is being compared with Microsoft’s accusation that the company has used its market power to bring down its competitors.

CMA said that Google has used its dominant power to strengthen its ad exchange platform, AdX. Google charges the highest on AdX and it is a center for many advertisements buying and selling. Google takes about 20% of each bid that is done on AdX.

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by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World

Survey Highlights Key Challenges and Breakthroughs in Small Business Marketing: Budgets, AI, and Influencers Dominate

SimpleTexting conducted a survey to find out which marketing strategies and tactics are giving the best results in the US markets. The survey was conducted among 400 small business managers which are managing their business in the USA. Most of the respondents of the survey said that their business sees the most growth on Facebook, websites and review sites.

The survey asked the managers about the biggest challenges they face in marketing. 52% of the respondents said that a limited budget is the biggest challenge when it comes to marketing their business. 34% feel time constraint and 28% feel that finding the right marketing channels are the biggest challenges for them. Other challenges that business managers are facing are keeping up with tech trends (27%), lack of marketing expertise (23%), finding and retaining a strong team (20%) and creating the marketing (19%).

The respondents were also asked about what are the most influential marketing tactics for them. 33% answered reviews on websites like Google and Amazon, 32% said referrals and 26% said influencers/endorsements are the most influential marketing tactics for them. Other influential marketing tactics for respondents included sponsorships (25%), promotions/discounts (23%), partnerships (22%) and loyalty programs (21%). Contests/giveaways (9%) and press/news coverage (6%) were also answered as influential marketing tactics by some.

There are also some marketing trends seen among small businesses. The biggest marketing trend among small businesses is AI and Machine Learning (61%). 85% of the small businesses say that they use AI in their marketing which promises them marketing success. 40% of the small businesses are using social commerce for marketing, 37% are doing ethical marketing and 36% of them are making short-form video content for marketing purposes. Micro-influencers or local influencers (33%) and localized SEO (16%) are also being used by small businesses for marketing.

Explore the charts below for deeper insights into the current state of small business marketing

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by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World

US, UK, And EU Enter Into First Legal Treaty On AI Safety

The US, the UK, and the EU have all entered into a legally binding treaty called the Framework Convention on AI.

This is the first agreement that’s designed to ensure these regions follow proper AI safety requirements that align with human rights as well as democracy. The document lays down the foundation for important AI principles regarding AI systems.

This includes how user data can remain safe, how the law is obeyed, and how everything must remain transparent at all times. Every nation signing the agreement needs to adopt the best legislative measures and administrative tasks that are outlined in the agreement.

Therefore, you can think of it as a guide on how to best use AI and prevent its abuse.

Interestingly, the framework is not something new. It’s been under discussion since the start of 2019 and several countries are already following it including Israel, and Norway. Andorra. Moldova, Georgia, and San Marino.

In the past few months, we’ve seen a huge number of AI safety documents prevail. This just reflects how popular the technology is and what punishments signatories might incur when they go against it.

As mentioned by The Financial Times recently, this treaty is legally binding but following it can only be done through monitoring. This is never considered the best form of enforcing it.

Whatever the case may be, one thing is for sure. We feel it might serve as the most important blueprint for various nations that want to curate their own laws related to AI.

As we speak, America has several bills in the pipeline linked to AI while the EU has already passed historic AI regulations. Now, the UK is looking for its own framework on the subject.

California is the closest to passing its first AI Safety Act which many tech companies like OpenAI have tried to ignore for so long.

Highlighting the best AI standards and ensuring they’re met has always been a topic of great debate. Hence, it’s going to be interesting to see how signing this new treaty will change the way AI is used today.

As far as implementation of the treaty is concerned, that will come into play starting three months after several signatories formally approve it.

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Read next: Despite Big Privacy Claims, Meta, Apple, and Google Share User Data with Law Enforcement Upon Request
by Dr. Hura Anwar via Digital Information World

Despite Big Privacy Claims, Meta, Apple, and Google Share User Data with Law Enforcement Upon Request

Pavel Durov, Telegram’s CEO, was recently arrested and now the users of Telegram are concerned whether the CEO will give their data to law enforcement or not. Telegram has always been involved in giving a platform to criminals who do a lot of things from drug trade to selling explicit videos and images of minors and adults. It is almost considered a dark web for dummy criminals. As Durov was arrested, many users came to know that the platform isn’t encrypted as it claimed to be, and now their data can easily be accessed by law enforcements.

Telegram had handed over some of its data to German authorities in January 2024 despite it claiming to protect users’ privacy. This makes us wonder if our data on different social media apps is as private as we think. So the answer is no about 70% to 80% of the time. Despite many big companies like Apple, Google and Meta campaigning to protect their users’ privacy, they would easily handover your data to authorities when requested.

Between January and June 2023, there were 270,000 law enforcement requests received by Meta for user data and nearly 77% of the data was disclosed to the authorities by the company. Google also disclosed 81% of the user data to law enforcement agencies in May 2023. Same goes for Apple as it disclosed 83% of user data in the first half of 2023 after 180,00 requests received, and 78% of the data in the second half of 2023.

These aren’t the only big tech companies to give user data to authorities as TikTok is also doing it. In 2023, 10,000 requests were received by TikTok for user data. There is a “Transparency Report” on TikTok's website which shows the data disclosed by country by them. In the USA, 71% of the information was disclosed, 68% in the UK and 57% in Australia.

It shows that it is pretty easy for law enforcements to get access to your data and the companies often hand it over to them without much resistance. The data law enforcement authorities get from these companies include names, addresses, contact information, emails, messages, videos, images and calendars and even contact lists. There is also a gag order given by authorities to these companies that they can only say that your data has been handed over to the authorities after six months to one year after the data has been disclosed.

The Guardian says that law enforcement authorities can obtain your data by “key search warrant” or “reverse search warrant” and also from “geofence warrant” or “reverse location warrant”. Itt means that your type of address or location at a specific time can become a part of the crime. So, Telegram users and users of other apps should know that if you are a part of some criminal activities, law enforcement authorities probably know.

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by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World

YouTube Liaison Answers Most Asked Questions About YouTube Algorithm and SEO

There has always been talks about how rankings on YouTube are done and which factors and variables make rankings affected. YouTube Liaison in a recent interview answered some of the common questions YouTube creators ask about its SEO strategies. The first question that was asked was if the category of the YouTube video is important for the algorithm. The answer is that it isn’t that important and most of the time, YouTube doesn’t consider it. But still, content creators should try to choose a category that is the best aligned with their/viewer interest.

YouTube Liaison said that if you want to please the algorithm, please the audience and make videos which the audience loves and wants to watch. When asked if tags are important for YouTube videos, the answer was that they aren’t really important. It is better that you put efforts in your title and description than the tags. This question was followed by the question about hashtags and if they really matter. Still, the answer was that hashtags don’t matter that much unless you are hoping on a trend.

The YouTube Liason was also asked if consistency matters in the video performance or not. The answer is yes, it does matter but not in the way that you think. YouTube consistency matters in a way that you upload new videos everyday, at the same time and follow a strict schedule. This way your audience will be able to connect more with your content. Keywords in the video description also matter for the algorithm but try to not stuff them.

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Another question was about why some videos take too much time to take off. The answer is again the audience. Sometimes your core audience likes the video but not the general audience. Sometimes, your core audience doesn’t find the video engaging but the general audience loves the video but it will take some time for the video to reach them.

Some other things that were found through this QnA was that low retention on embedded videos doesn’t matter to the algorithm and the algorithm also doesn’t look at your file name. The last question was if keeping different types of content like shorts, long form videos and lives on the same channel confuses the algorithm. If your audience is interested in all types of content, then all these content types are worth keeping on the same channel. But if you think that different types of audience likes different content, try making content on different channels.

You can watch the complete video here:



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by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World

Pressure From EU Forces X To Abort Training AI Chatbot Grok With User Data

Elon Musk has just confirmed that his X app has withdrawn plans to train the popular AI chatbot Grok with user data. The news comes after facing scrutiny and pressure from EU officials.

The region is known for its tough regulatory laws. Last month, X suspended the move temporarily after it was legally prosecuted by the DPC in Ireland for the practice. No tech giant wants to engage in legal proceedings for this reason when the DPC is involved. Hence, it seems like X has gone with the permanent decision to abort any such data training plans.

The news was a prompt decision and this immediately resulted in all legal proceedings being conducted against the company. Remember, the DPC is the region’s top regulator, and seeing it raise concerns against X was never a good look for Musk and his executives at X.

The company has been giving its users quite some time now to opt out of the data training practice that it would employ for Grok. Moreover, it tried to defend the move by stating it was a default action that was set up for the public.

Under the GDPR, so many companies must get explicit consent before taking part in the practice. The DPC also issued officials with a notice to ensure what data processing really meant and how it was being used for AI training. This includes how personal data would benefit the firm.

After seeing X’s prompt action, we won’t be seeing it get scrutinized further for Grok and the DPC hopes Musk’s company and others can remain proactive and follow these regulations that remain in place throughout Europe.

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Read next: Deep Fakes Pose Serious Risk to Scientific Research, Says Oxford's Sibel Erduran
by Dr. Hura Anwar via Digital Information World

Deep Fakes Pose Serious Risk to Scientific Research, Says Oxford's Sibel Erduran

Professor of Science Education and Director for Research at Oxford University, Sibel Erduran, wrote a paper about how altered content on the internet is affecting scientific studies and research. As artificial intelligence (AI) is getting common, deep fakes have also seen a rise. With the rise in technology, deep fakes are becoming more real. Erudan says that scientific research requires trust and that is not possible with the amount of altered information available on the internet.

In 2023, thousands of research papers were recalled due to fake content present in them. The professor says that scientific integrity is already under threat, and now deep fakes are adding another layer of threat to them. Deep fakes can also alter the videos of respected scientists and make them say wrong information which can become a big problem. Issues like climate change and public health are under the most threat.

Erudan says that if we make deep fake detection tools, it can save a bit of scientific integrity. On the other hand, deep fakes can give some opportunities for learning too. They can be beneficial to technological advancements and innovation. For instance, deep fakes can serve as realistic simulation for medical students to learn medical skills without compromising safety.

More than half of Americans have been fooled by deep fakes. According to a survey, 33% to 50% Americans couldn’t identify deep fakes. To keep ourselves safe from deep fakes, we should focus on deep learning and enhance our critical thinking skills. Misinformation detection tools and deep fake detection tools can help us combat fake content.

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by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World