Findings from our latest Trust in Advertising Report
The programmatic landscape is experiencing a tightening of standards, with half of advertisers now enforcing explicit inclusion or exclusion policies regarding Made-for-Advertising (MFA) and AI-generated (MFAI) inventory—a significant jump since 2025.
But a gap remains between corporate intent and campaign reality: Among advertisers with formal policies, 29% admit they use these sites to extend reach, balance CPMs, and boost overall vanity metrics.
Advertisers, and advertising agencies in particular, report significantly higher levels of concern this year around ad fraud and opaque programmatic placements funding bad actors. Despite these fears, the likelihood of brands moving to a manually selected inclusion list remains entirely unchanged compared to 2025.
In addition, perceptions on the value of quality journalism saw a notable spike in support this year. 79% of advertisers agree that advertising in legitimate news environments has a positive or neutral impact on consumers, up a significant 9 points from 2025. Additionally, 67% state that supporting news organizations with ad dollars is important to their organization—a massive 12-point jump year-over-year.
But Advertiser Perception’s June 2026 Trust in Advertising report also looks at these trust factors in combination with other key drivers of consideration when working with media partners such as proof of performance and audience. What we’ve found is that, while trust factors may be rising in importance, performance- and audience-related factors remain the most critical factors, leaving advertisers trapped between ethical intentions and the relentless pressure to deliver performance.
Advertisers aren’t abandoning their ethics—they are actively vocal about supporting credible journalism and fighting fraud. However, they are trying to survive an increasingly complex ecosystem where performance metrics are non-negotiable, often forcing them to compromise on the very inventory policies they wish they could enforce.
Media platforms that can bridge the trust gap between providing transparent and accurate campaign reporting as well as brand-safe environments for advertising are positioned to win. Right now there’s no media channel that leads in positive perception across both categories, but connected TV (CTV) and retail media networks are among the leading channels for both – and they’re similarly both channels that advertisers will continue to move ad dollars toward in 2026, according to AP’s U.S. ad spending forecast.
