Europe Bans Political Ads, but Not Propaganda: Politics Goes Underground

At the heart of the new rules is an almost total ban on using so-called sensitive data—including inferred political views, ethnic origin or religious beliefs—to target audiences.

Personal data can only be used if it comes directly from the individual and if they give “explicit and separate consent solely for political advertising.” In practice, building a legal database of potential voters has become nearly impossible.

Regulation 2024/900, which entered into force in April last year and has applied in full since 10 October, imposes a long list of new obligations on political advertisers.

Every political ad must be clearly labelled and must include details about who paid for it, the purpose, how much money was spent, and whether the ad relates to a specific election or legislative process. The EU also plans to create a central online repository containing copies of all political ads and information about their financing.

Disappearing Millions and Rising Inequalities

The withdrawal of Meta and Google from Europe’s political advertising market has removed around €87 million in annual spending observed during the 2024 European Parliament elections—roughly 30,000 ads. Much of this activity has shifted to organic posts and influencer collaborations.

Europe’s ad-tech industry may lose 2–3% of its revenues, or roughly €900 million a year. Publishers and news outlets that monetised political campaigns through Meta Ads Manager or Google Ads have lost a major source of funding.

Krzysztof Izdebski of the Batory Foundation warns that the decisions by Alphabet and Meta also cut off access to valuable data about political promotions, making large-scale research far more difficult.

“We can expect campaigns to become more mass-oriented and less precise. Without the ability to ‘tailor’ messages, parties will revert to simple, general slogans,” he notes.

Izdebski adds that parties will increasingly invest in generating organic traffic—encouraging active users to create or share political content without using advertising tools. “This makes political messaging harder to monitor and reduces public oversight over election campaigns.”

A New Reality for NGOs and Media

The new rules pose a major challenge for NGOs, foundations and civic-minded media outlets. They must now assess whether their paid online activities count as political advertising.

Campaigns on climate action, rule of law or public health may be classified as “designed to influence legislative or regulatory processes,” triggering obligations such as submitting declarations, publishing transparency notices and archiving materials for seven years.

At the same time, these organisations lose access to the most effective paid promotional tools on social media. They will need to rely more heavily on organic engagement, mailing lists and partnerships to reach audiences.

According to Izdebski, the changes will hit smaller political parties and grassroots groups the hardest—those without access to mainstream media or large budgets.

“Banning ads reduces their visibility and strengthens the dominance of actors who are already well-established in the public debate,” he explains.

Civic organisations are already struggling to publish ads that even indirectly relate to political or social issues but are mainly meant to encourage financial support for their work. “They stand to lose visibility and resources—ultimately making it harder to fulfil their missions.”

The Transparency Paradox

Regulation 2024/900 is an ambitious attempt to enforce transparency in political advertising—but its strict rules may end up making the political ad market less visible.

“It’s possible that further regulations will limit which content can be displayed at all, making social media in Europe less functional. People may increasingly use VPNs to access ‘normal’ platforms outside the EU,” warns Fedorowicz.

Supporters of the regulation argue that it strengthens Europe’s defences against disinformation and foreign influence. Critics counter that it pushes public debate into unregulated spaces.

“If campaigns move into messaging apps and closed groups, the public debate becomes fragmented,” says Izdebski.

“Instead of a shared space for discussion, we get isolated information bubbles where distrust grows and disinformation spreads more easily. Democracy becomes weaker when opposing views no longer meet in the same public sphere.”

In the end, the impact will depend on whether the EU and its member states can build transparent alternative channels for political communication. The regulation does not eliminate the problem—it simply moves political influence into new, less visible corners of the digital world.