ANA, 4A’s Slam IAB CEO’s Apple Remarks As “Acerbic”

America’s Association of National Advertisers (ANA) and the American Association of Advertising Agencies (4A’s) have entered into a war of words with Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) CEO David Cohen, following the latter’s remarks about Apple and privacy.

At the IAB’s annual leadership meeting (ALM), Cohen took a shot at Apple and legislators.

“Apple is fine with advertising, as long as they get to control it on their terms,” he told industry leaders gathered on Marco Island, Florida for the meeting.

“Apple exemplifies the cynicism and hypocrisy that underpins the prevailing extremist view.”

He then went on to say that Apple is “attacking [the industry] from the inside out” and was hypocritical for pushing through its AppTrackingTransparency tool while trying to build its own ad business.

Not content with Apple, Cohen moved onto legislators that branded personalised advertising as a form of surveillance capitalism.

“It’s time to call out this dystopian nonsense for what it is: insane.”

In response, the 4A’s and the ANA issued a joint retort to Cohen.

“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 statement read.

“It is with that as a fundamental premise that the 4A’s and ANA reject the acerbic tone, texture, and prescriptions offered by the IAB at their recent ALM conference. Our industry was built on a foundation of responsible marketing.

“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’ ten 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.

“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.”

Lead image credit: IAB.

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