Advertising and ad labelling

What is happening

Marketing places ads with dozens of influencers, directly and through agencies. Nobody can say clearly who obtains the ad identifier, who files the reports and who is answerable if the data in the register does not match: the contracts are silent on all of it.

A request or a decision to open a case has arrived from the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS): the ad is said to be misleading, a mandatory warning is missing, or a comparison with competitors reads as an unsupported claim of superiority. The reply has to be on time and to the point, not in generalities.

The company is unsure whether a publication is advertising at all: a post on its own channel, a review by a partner, a brand mention in a podcast. The answer determines whether labelling is needed and who is responsible for it.

What the law says

• Federal Law No. 38-FZ of 13 March 2006 "On Advertising" (the Advertising Law) sets the general requirements: accuracy and fairness, rules on comparisons, mandatory warnings and restrictions for particular categories of goods and services.
• For online advertising, Article 18.1 of the Advertising Law requires the label "Advertisement", identification of the advertiser, an ad identifier and the transfer of data to the unified online advertising register through ad data operators.
• Since 2025 mandatory levies have been payable on online advertising. Who calculates them and how they are reflected in the price is worth setting out expressly in contracts with agencies and platforms.
• The Advertising Law prohibits placing ads on resources of foreign agents and on resources to which access in Russia is restricted. This needs to be taken into account when choosing influencers and platforms, not discovered after publication.
• The Code of Administrative Offences provides for fines on the advertiser, the producer and the distributor of advertising for breaches of advertising legislation; cases are opened and heard by the regional offices of the FAS.
• A decision or order of the competition authority can be challenged in the commercial court; under the Commercial Procedure Code (APK) the application must be filed within three months of the day the company learned that its rights had been infringed.

What we do

• We review creatives, landing pages and integration scripts before launch: accuracy of claims, mandatory warnings and restrictions for your category.
• We design the labelling scheme: who obtains the identifier and when, who files the reports, how statements are reconciled and levies accounted for.
• We draft and amend contracts with agencies, influencers and platforms: allocation of labelling duties and liability for errors in the data.
• We assess borderline publications: whether the material is advertising and which requirements apply to it.
• We respond to FAS requests, prepare written explanations and represent the company at the commission hearing.
• We challenge decisions, orders and penalty rulings in court.

What we will need from you

• The creatives, links to publications and landing pages in question, with placement dates.
• Contracts with agencies, influencers, platforms and your ad data operator.
• An export from the ad data operator's account showing which creatives are registered and which reports have been filed.
• Material supporting the advertising claims: research, certificates, promotion terms.
• If a case is under way: the FAS request or decision and all subsequent correspondence.