This story originally appeared on Engadget
It’s been almost a year since the FTC warned social media influencers that they should “clearly and conspicuously [disclose]” if they’re being paid for a post or video. But according to a new Princeton University research, most YouTube and Pinterest influencers still don’t add proper disclaimers to the content they produce.
The researchers analyzed over 500,000 YouTube videos and over 2.1 million unique Pinterest pins from August to September 2017 for the study. They found that 3,472 videos and 18,237 pins in the bunch had affiliate links, but only 10 and seven percent, respectively, contained written disclosures.
Those that did have disclosures didn’t even follow the FTC’s guidelines, which recommend lengthier explanations than “hey, these are affiliate links.” The FTC wants influencers to be very clear in their wording: for…
