They tried to block people using adblockers perhaps or maybe they rolled the block out in a non-uniform manner? I still haven't had any problems.

NoScript baby.

Really? So the advertising agency would have an Investigation Unit that makes sure the companies aren't scams before allowing them to advertise?

If they want to minimize their risk for liability, yes. If they want to freewheel or assume liability no. Let the market decide.

Some stuff can always slip through for sure but when more than half of the ads are looking illegal, that's going to be hard to invoke that they are doing due diligence.

Wasn't a problem with broadcast TV.

Seems like the internet ad industry wants scale, but doesn't want to solve the problems of scale.

After advertising. Which is admittedly kind of useless in a world of anonymous, unaccountable, international advertisers.

e.g. https://www.asa.org.uk/rulings/person-s--unknown-a23-1198241...

Enforcement is very limited to "misleading ad must not appear again". Eventually they'll have to do something a bit toothier or we're going to have an all-scam internet.

That sounds like a classic example of doing something and making the situation worse (aka almost every regulation ever)

If advertising providers were de jure and de facto liable for fraud, then that will raise the bar for competing advertising providers, as if Google wasn't enough of a monopoly.

Regulation almost universally benefits established players and stifles competition, which is why a lot of regulation is (secretly) backed by large companies. (Note that I'm not saying that regulation never hurts large companies, and regulation can hurt both large companies and small companies/society.)

> That sounds like a classic example of doing something and making the situation worse (aka almost every regulation ever)

Such a weird take.. without regulation we would still have child labor, slave labor, cancer causing shit in basically everything, no seatbelts, even worse corruption in politics and companies, .. list goes on ..

It is true that some regulation is meant to thwart competition and keep entrenched players in power. However it is pretty far to say "almost every regulation ever". Would you prefer to live in an age where anyone can sell a tincture on the sidewalk that claims to cure any ailment? Would you prefer to have the food you put in your mouth be a gamble on its quality? Would you prefer companies be able to dump their poisonous waste anywhere they want?

We don't have to be on the side of 100% regulation is good but I hope we can see that a lot of regulation is actually making the world we live in liveable.

"Fraud should be allowed, otherwise small companies can't rely on it to become big" is QUITE the take.

It's simply a question of fraud. Fraud is a crime. And aiding and abetting to commit a crime is a crime as well.