Publisher Warner Bros. has settled charges made by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) over undisclosed, paid sponsorship of Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor by YouTube content producers.
The FTC says Warner Bros. paid YouTubers like PewDiePie “hundreds to tens of thousands of dollars” to post positive endorsements of Shadow of Mordor. The videos, viewed over 5.5 million times, were not adequately presented as such. The FTC did concede that the disclosures were present in the description boxes of some videos, but they weren’t accessible until users clicked the “show more” button.
Warner Bros. is now barred from not adequately disclosing similar business arrangements in the future.
In similar news, YouTubers TmarTn and ProSyndicate are in hot water after failing to disclose their ownership of a CS:GO betting site.
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