Junk food firms ‘target children on Facebook’

JUNK food firms are ‘relentlessly’ marketing to children on social media using the same controversial tactics Cambridge Analytica used in Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, it was the Dáil was told yesterday.

Advertisers on the likes of Facebook use similar techniques to extract ‘huge amounts of information from children’ including ‘who they are, where they live, where they go, who their friends are, their hobbies, heroes, favourite foods’, the Irish Heart Foundation said.

The data obtained is used by brands to enter children’s social media newsfeeds and interact with them as though they are friends, the Oireachtas Committee on Children and Youth Affairs was told.

Chris Macey, IHF head of advocacy, warned the world’s best marketing minds have unprecedented access to children and are using it to ‘distort their food choices’.

‘Junk brands have achieved a wholly inappropriate proximity to children – pestering them relentlessly in school, at home, even in their bedrooms through their smartphones. It’s called the “brand in the hand” and gives marketers constant access to children,’ he said. Mr Macey said if, as suspected, Cambridge Analytica were able to swing the votes in the US and UK by targeting voters using data from Facebook, then children will be much more susceptible to the practice. Cambridge Analytica attempted to persuade adult voters to exercise their franchise in a particular way over a short period of time,’ he said.

Advertisers use data on children from digital platforms like Facebook, the committee was told.

‘They use this information to connect with children on a one-to-one basis, employing the so-called 3Es – powerful engagement, emotional and entertainment-based tactics,’ Mr Macey said.

‘There’s a strong emphasis on fun and humour, using sports stars and celebrities, festivals, special days and competitions. The effect is that children associate positive emotions and excitement with junk brands. They often don’t realise they’re being advertised at.

‘Brands get onto their newsfeeds and interact like real friends, effectively becoming part of children’s social lives. They even get children to become marketers for them by tagging friends into ads and posting messages.’

The causal link between unhealthy food marketing and child obesity has been conclusively proven, resulting in regulation of broadcast advertising to children five years ago, TDs and senators heard.

Mr Macey said this prompted an explosion in unregulated digital marketing that is more personalised, effective and therefore potentially more damaging.

He said the State’s response to the crisis so far had been ‘feeble’, putting its faith through a voluntary code in an industry where major players ‘have shown consistently they’ll do as little as they can get away with’. At yesterday’s meeting the IHF was seeking support for a blanket ban on junk food marketing to under 16s.

Almost a third of Irish boys and girls were overweight in 2016.

‘Huge amounts of information’