A Instagram post by reality star Lauren Goodger promoting a foreign exchange trading tips service has been banned after she failed to clearly mark it as an advert.
The post by the former Only Way Is Essex star for @hannahd.fx, seen on March 4, featured an image showing a WhatsApp conversation with a screenshot of purported foreign exchange trading profits and a message that stated “£1730 profits in the last 2 days”.
A caption under the image stated: “Let me introduce you all to @hannahd.fx. She is a Forex trader who sends out trades everyday which take under 5 minutes to place. Everyone who joins her team, receives a FREE Forex beginners [sic] course worth £150, to help you learn while you earn. She has been consistently profitable and has the freedom to work anywhere in the world. If you want to start 2021 right and earn a second source of income, message @hannahd.fx on Instagram to join her team and to get started.”
A reader complained that the post was not obviously identifiable as an ad and the claims about profitability were misleading.
The “persons unknown” trading as @hannahd.fx told the Advertising Standards Authority that they would ensure their future marketing communications did not breach the rules.
Goodger said @hannahd.fx had sent her a script and dictated the contents of the post’s caption, and she had been remunerated by them for making the post.
She told the ASA she would ensure her future marketing communications featured prominent identifiers such as “ad”.
The ASA said: “We understood that Ms Goodger was promoting @hannahd.fx’s foreign exchange trading tips service. However, we noted that the post did not feature the label ‘#ad’, or a similar, prominent identifier.
“In the absence of clear and prominent identifiers, we concluded the post was not obviously identifiable as marketing communication.”
The ASA said it had not seen any evidence to support the claims about profits in the ad, and ruled that both of them were misleading.
The ASA concluded: “The ad must not appear again in the form complained about. We told person(s) unknown trading as @hannahd.fx and Lauren Goodger to ensure that their ads were obviously identifiable as marketing communications – for example by including clear and prominent identifiers – and that they did not make profitability claims for foreign exchange tips services unless they held evidence to that effect.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel