With the June 3 local elections ahead, a race for cash firepower has begun online. Naver has been running ads for the June 3 local elections targeting voters ages 18 and older since on the 21st. Candidates who buy more ads can show their faces to more voters on the portal.
According to the industry on the 26th, Naver began displaying ads for the 9th nationwide simultaneous local elections at 12 a.m. on the 21st, when the official campaign period started, and plans to end them at 11 p.m. on the 2nd of next month. Although the official campaign period runs until 11:59:59 p.m. on the 2nd of next month, Naver will end election ads one hour earlier to prevent delayed exposure risks due to PC, mobile, and internet user environments.
Naver's election ads for the nationwide simultaneous local elections consist of "impression-based" ad products, in which multiple ads appear in rotation, and "search-based" ad products, in which a set ad appears based on the search term. Because impression-based ads rotate, different users may see different ads even if they access Naver at the same time. "Search-based" ads appear at the top of search results when users search for keywords closely related to a candidate. Election ads are shown more frequently during key times in the campaign period, such as "the first week of the campaign, the early voting period, and the day before the election."
In April–May, Naver rolled out election ad packages. The packages were largely divided into a "party ad package," which can widely promote a party's pledges to voters nationwide, and a "candidate ad package," which concentrates on delivering a candidate's pledges to voters in a district. Party ad packages ranged from 100 million won per package up to 500 million won, and candidate ad packages consisted of a 5 million won package (a total of 640,000 impressions) and a 2 million won package (a total of 250,000 impressions), depending on the district. Naver also sold "brand search ads" to candidates for metropolitan government heads (mayors and provincial governors) and superintendents of education. For brand search ads, in Seoul and Gyeonggi, the metropolitan government head (mayor or provincial governor) rate is 25 million won and the superintendent of education rate is 15 million won. In other regions, both the metropolitan government head and superintendent rates are 10 million won.
Naver's candidate ads are "targeted" ads served to users in specific regions. They display different ads by region based on users' internet protocol (IP) information. Naver said, "We configured the ad products in accordance with the Public Official Election Act," and added, "On mobile, ads are shown based on the Wi-Fi connection location."
Regarding concerns that only a specific candidate's ads are shown more often, Naver said, "Election ads are displayed in proportion to the volume of ads purchased by the candidate," and added, "Therefore, if there is a difference in the quantity purchased by each candidate, a proportional difference in ad impressions may occur."
However, because this ad method uses location information, some at home and abroad criticize targeted ads for distorting elections. Ellen Weintraub, former chair of the Federal Election Commission (FEC), previously said of targeting ads that they "fuel polarization, division, and the spread of disinformation in the electoral process."
Since the European Union (EU) strengthened its political ad transparency rules in October last year, Meta and Google have not been running political ads in that region. Political content itself is not banned. The "Regulation on the Transparency and Targeting of Political Advertising (TTPA)," which the EU fully implemented in October last year, mandates that online political ads specify key information such as the ad sponsor, related election, expenditure details, and targeting methods. According to Meta, in the EU, parties, candidates, and civic groups can freely post and share political posts via their own account or page, but amplification—artificially expanding the reach of such posts through paid ads—has become impossible.
On July 25 last year, Meta said in a statement, "We will no longer run ads related to politics, elections, and social issues on company platforms such as Facebook and Instagram." Earlier, in 2024, Google also said, "The TTPA's definition of political ads is so broad that it is difficult to clearly determine which content must be restricted at scale in various EU regions," adding, "We plan to stop serving political ads before the TTPA takes effect."
Naver said, "We serve targeted ads by verifying the user's location and whether they are of voting age, and we do not use 'micro-targeting' such as by age group or gender," adding, "We will more closely monitor election-related ads to provide voters with objective and accurate information."