Any advertiser promoting sites or apps that generate deepfake porn, that show instructions on how to create deepfake porn and that endorse or compare various deepfake porn services will be suspended without warning. They will no longer be able to publish their ads on Google, as well. The company will start implementing this rule on May 30 and is giving advertisers the chance to remove any ad in violation of the new policy. As 404 Media notes, the rise of deepfake technologies has led to an increasing number of ads promoting tools that specifically target users wanting to create sexually explicit materials. Some of those tools reportedly even pretend to be wholesome services to be able to get listed on the Apple App Store and Google Play Store, but it's masks off on social media where they promote their ability to generate manipulated porn.

Google has, however, already started prohibiting services that create sexually explicit deepfakes in Shopping ads. Similar to its upcoming wider policy, the company has banned Shopping ads for services that "generate, distribute, or store synthetic sexually explicit content or synthetic content containing nudity. " Those include deepfake porn tutorials and pages that advertise deepfake porn generators.

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“The Recommended section of the Start menu will show some Microsoft Store apps,” according to the release notes. “These apps come from a small set of curated developers.”

The app suggestions are enabled by default, but you can restore your previously pristine Windows experience if you’ve installed the update, fortunately. To do so, go into Settings and select Personalization > Start and switch the “Show recommendations for tips, app promotions and more” toggle to “off.”

The new “feature” arrives just weeks after it appeared as an Insider beta, showing how quickly Microsoft can implement things when it wants to. It certainly wasn’t enough time to receive the kind of user feedback the Insider program is designed for.

The update is bound to rub customers the wrong way, considering that Windows 11 starts at $139 for the Home version. While removing it isn’t a huge deal, it may also remind folks of the needless time they spent stripping bloatware from OEM Windows installations. Microsoft previously tested ads in the Windows 11 File Explorer, but ended the experiment shortly afterward.

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The service says its terms don't allow third-party apps to switch off ads "because that prevents the creator from being rewarded for viewership." Like it's been doing over the past few months since it started cracking down on ad blockers, YouTube suggests signing up for a Premium membership if you want to watch ad-free. YouTube Premium will set you back $14 a month.

Back in November, YouTube told us that it "launched a global effort to urge viewers with ad blockers enabled to allow ads on YouTube or try YouTube Premium for an ad free experience." It started by showing pop-ups whenever an ad blocker is in use telling you that it's against the website's TOS. Soon after that, you could only play up to three videos with an ad blocker on before you can no longer load any. Google also later admitted that if you have an ad blocker installed, you "may experience suboptimal viewing," such as having to wait a longer period before a video loads.

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In particular, Roku is hoping to show you commercials while whatever you're watching or playing on the third-party device attached to it is on pause. In its patent, it described several methods on how it can detect whether the show or game on screen is paused, such as receiving a pause signal from the remote control, detecting a pause icon, looking at several video frames and determining that the image on screen hasn't changed for some time and getting a silent audio signal from the HDMI connection.

If it works as intended, those ads wouldn't impact your viewing or playing experience (much), assuming you're truly stepping away or doing something else in the meantime. While you'd probably prefer those experiences to be free of ads altogether, Roku is at least looking to make sure that it's serving you relevant ads. It could analyze frozen video or audio frames and use automatic content recognition (ACR) technology to identify what's on screen. Or it could analyze metadata to show ads connected to what you're playing or watching. It could also serve commercials based on what third-party device is attached to your TV.

As Lowpass notes, the company could have conjured the idea because manufacturers typically don't make a lot of money from hardware sales. For the fiscal year of 2023, Roku lost $44 million on smart TVs. Similarly, Samsung's visual display and digital appliances division posted $37.5 million in operating losses for last year's fourth quarter. Meanwhile, ads and services generated $1.6 billion in profit for Roku. This idea could potentially make it more money… if the prospect of watching commercials while your show or game is paused doesn't turn you off buying Roku TV, of course. This is just a patent at this point in time, though, and Roku may very well end up scrapping it and not implementing it at all.

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Further, you can disable the advertisements altogether. To do so, just go to Personalization under Settings and then toggle off "Show recommendations for tips, app promotions, and more" in the Start section. Like any other Microsoft experiment, it may never reach wider rollout, but you may want to remember the aforementioned steps, since the company does have history of incorporating ads into its desktop platforms. Last year, Microsoft also deployed experimental promo spots for its services like OneDrive in the menu that pops up when you click on your profile photo.

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Some users may find this annoying, but the announcement makes it clear that ads will be relevant to the search query and will be clearly labeled as a sponsored post. Ads will also likely be culled from your interests as represented by prior search queries and all of your various actions on the social media platform. In other words, the algorithm will do what the algorithm already does, but in a new location.

Clicking on a sponsored post will not interrupt your search, which is nice. The ad mirrors the in-feed experience and allows users to continue scrolling through the search results, whether you click on an ad or not. There’s likely to be no shortage of advertisers as TikTok says the feature is automatically enabled for pre-existing merchants. In other words, advertisers have to opt-out of appearing alongside search results.

Having an ad-free search bar was fun while it lasted, but this move has been a long time coming. It was something of an inevitability, as competitors like Instagram started doing the same thing earlier this year. It’s worth noting that ads already appear in the regular TikTok feed, nestled between videos posted by folks you actually follow. Don Draper’s search-bar fever dream is rolling out now to global TikTok users.

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The report comes from watchdog organization Ekō, which is sharing its work to draw attention to the social network’s “sub-standard moderation practices” ahead of the Digital Services Act (DSA) going into effect in Europe later this week. It details how, over a period of a few days in early August, the organization attempted to buy 13 Facebook ads, all of which used AI-generated images and included text that was clearly against the company’s rules

Ekō pulled the ads before they could be seen by any users. The group requested exact wording of the ads be withheld, but offered descriptions of some of the most egregious examples. Approved ads included one, placed in France, that “called for the execution of a prominent MEP because of their stance on immigration,” as well as an ad targeting German users that “called for synagogues to be burnt to the ground to ‘protect White Germans.’” Meta also approved ads in Spain that claimed the most recent election was stolen and that people should engage in violent protests to reverse it.

“This report was based on a very small sample of ads and is not representative of the number of ads we review daily across the world," a spokesperson for Meta said in a statement. "Our ads review process has several layers of analysis and detection, both before and after an ad goes live. We’re taking extensive steps in response to the DSA and continue to invest significant resources to protect elections and guard against hate speech as well as against violence and incitement.”

While there were a handful of ads that were stopped by Meta’s checks, Ekō says that the ads were prevented from running because they were flagged as political, not because of the violent and hate-filled rhetoric in them. (The company requires political advertisers to go through an additional vetting process before they are eligible to place ads.)

Ekō is using the report to advocate for additional safeguards under the DSA, a sweeping law that requires tech platforms to limit some kinds of targeted advertising and allow users to opt out of recommendation algorithms. (Several services, including Facebook, Instagram and TikTok have recently made changes to comply with the latter provision.) It also requires platforms to identify and mitigate "systemic risks," including those related to illegal and violent content.

“With a few clicks, we were able to prove just how easy it is for bad actors to spread hate speech and disinformation,” Vicky Wyatt, Ekō’s campaign director, said in a statement. “With EU elections around the corner, European leaders must enforce the DSA to its fullest extent and finally rein in these toxic companies.”

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Under that program, Spotify pays podcasters to read ads for the company’s own products. Its goal is to get more people to make shows for the platform.

Bloomberg previously reported that some white noise podcasters were making as much as $18,000 per month, in large part due to Spotify itself paying them for ad placements. It recently emerged that the company considered pulling those types of podcasts from its platform entirely because they were making a $38 million dent on its gross annual profit.

Ambassador ads haven’t been very effective on white noise podcasts, according to the report, since their listeners aren’t typically as engaged as they might be with a conversational or narrative podcast. They’re said to be more passive listeners who play these shows for background noise, so Spotify was not seeing much benefit from those ads, according to the report.

The makers of white noise podcasts will still be able to make money through direct support from listeners, paid memberships and automated ads. But this move is cutting off a key source of revenue. On the flip side, it may be beneficial for listeners who just want to hear chirping birds or thunderstorms without being interrupted by someone promoting the likes of Spotify’s podcasting tools.

In addition, Spotify has raised the threshold for Ambassador Ads eligibility. Podcasts now need to have 1,000 unique listeners over 60 days (up from 100) to participate in the program.

The company also plans to ask more podcasters to join its automated ads program. Spotify said it will split revenue from these ads in half with podcast operators, moving away from its previous approach of paying a flat rate based on impressions.

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The idea is to show you ads in a way that's better aligned with each platform where you watch YouTube. On mobile, you might be more inclined to watch content like Shorts in more bitesize chunks, so shorter, rapid-fire ad breaks may make more sense. However, YouTube notes that nearly two-thirds of CTV watch time in the US lasts at least 21 minutes — around the length of a sitcom episode on broadcast TV.

The service cites research indicating that 79 percent of viewers would prefer that YouTube bunch ads together rather than spreading them out over the duration of a longer video. As such, YouTube believes that minimizing disruption is the way to go, and having longer, fewer ad breaks is one idea it's trying.

It sounds a bit like the UK TV industry's approach to advertising versus how US networks handle things. You might have time to make a cup of tea during a Coronation Street ad break in Blighty, but good luck doing that between segments of a Grey's Anatomy episode Stateside.

It's unclear exactly how YouTube plans to divvy things up, such as if it will have one four-minute break per hour instead of four one-minute ad slots. The service also didn't say whether it will show more ads overall if it moves forward with this plan.

In addition, YouTube is looking into ways of being more transparent about the total length of ad breaks rather than showing the time remaining for each individual spot. Romana Pawar, YouTube Ads director of product management, wrote that the platform will soon publicly test an ad experience along those lines — you'll see just how long you have to wait before you can skip the remaining ads.

YouTube has been tinkering with CTV ad formats for quite some time. Earlier this year, it announced unskippable 30-second ads for its TV apps. You can probably expect the service to keep experimenting with how it presents ads across platforms. Alternatively, you can free yourself from having to put up with (seemingly less frequent) interruptions by stumping up for YouTube Premium's ad-free experience.

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The complaint alleges that Google continued to collect consumer data related to a user’s location even when a user turned the “location history” feature off. The company settled similar lawsuits in Arizona and Washington last year for illegally tracking consumers.

In addition to paying $93 million, Google agreed to “deter future misconduct.” This settlement, which won’t really hurt Google’s deep pockets, is important because the tech giant generates the majority of its revenue from advertising and location-based advertising is a critical feature of its advertising platform.

"Consistent with improvements we've made in recent years, we have settled this matter, which was based on outdated product policies that we changed years ago," Google spokesperson José Castañeda told Engadget.

Moving forward, the California AG is asking Google to provide additional transparency about location tracking by providing users with detailed information about location data it collects. The company must also provide disclaimers to users that their location information may be used for ad personalization.

Update, September 16, 2023, 2:26 AM ET: This story has been updated to add Google's statement.

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