Running ads on kids’ channels is not only a waste of money for most brands, as kids can’t buy products, but could potentially contain regulatory risk, according to new research from Adalytics. Moreover, for buyers, the presence of Google’s AI-powered Performance Max in the report’s findings calls into question the use of controls on its ad products.

Research outfit Adalytics found that YouTube ads that run on kids’ channels contain trackers that advertisers could use to retarget kids across the internet. Under the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), which YouTube was fined for violating in 2019, it is illegal to run targeted ads on children’s content.

Still, buyers find Google’s controls to avoid targeting kids’ content fall short…. Performance Max, a popular Google ad format that uses artificial intelligence to place ads across Google’s massive swath of inventory, doesn’t let buyers know which YouTube channels their ads ran on, multiple buyer sources told Adweek.

Read more:

Perloff, C. (2023, August 18). YouTube Ad Buyers Unknowingly Targeted Kids Despite Requests to Avoid. AdWeek. https://www.adweek.com/programmatic/youtube-buyers-unknowingly-targeted-ads-to-kids-despite-requests-to-avoid/