Tech and computing giants simply don’t come any bigger than Microsoft. Known the world over, it’s been at the heart of innovation for decades, but now it seems that the company is becoming more of a market follower than a market leader. Microsoft’s own search engine Bing is following in the footsteps of Facebook, Twitter, and Google in that it’s now banning crypto related advertising in full.
More bans, more problems
The ban will come into effect during June and July, with it being announced via an official Bing blog post back on May 14th. Crypto ad bans are becoming alarmingly common in 2018, as it appears that the fear of the unknown is blinding leading social media platforms and Internet search engines. Reasons behind the bans tend to all fall in line with a set script at this point, as Bing has cited the unregulated nature of the crypto market and its supposed risk. The official statement reads, “Because cryptocurrency and related products are not regulated, we have found them to present a possible elevated risk to our users with the potential for bad actors to participate in predatory behaviors, or otherwise scam consumers.” Unlike several other sites that have introduced instant bans, Bing is rolling out its ban in stages across the world during June and July.
The rocky relationship continues
To say that the mainstream media’s relationship with Bitcoin and cryptocurrency is love-hate would be something of an understatement. There seems to be a full-scale boycott of cryptocurrency advertising taking place right now, with Facebook starting the trend. When you consider that Facebook is actually looking to launch its very own cryptocurrency, the motives behind its ban decision seem questionable at best.
Potentially only a short-term measure
The legitimacy of the crypto ad ban trend has been hotly talked about, with some even believing that it is just a temporary measure. Pushing forward this theory is Eric Ly (LinkedIn Co-Founder), who said, “I do believe that this is a temporary period because like many domains, advertising has an incentive to support as many domains as possible. So, when regulation clears itself up, I believe there will come a time again when advertising of this nature around token sales will be re-permitted on these platforms.”
Crypto ad bans – like what’s now been implemented by Bing – are only increasing in number, but whether they are having the desired effect or not is still up for debate.
