United Kingdom

Two posts on IVG’s public TikTok account displayed boxes of e-cigarettes, featuring positive reviews and recommendations of various flavors. The ASA challenged whether the posts breached the CAP Code by promoting unlicensed nicotine-containing e-cigarettes and their components on TikTok.

The CAP Code states that except for media targeted exclusively to the trade, marketing communications with the direct or indirect effect of promoting nicotine-containing e-cigarettes and their components that are not licensed as medicines are not permitted in online media and some other forms of electronic media. The ASA concluded that the ads breached the Code as they promoted the e-cigarette brand from a public TikTok account. The ASA explained that TikTok posts can be distributed beyond the followers of a particular account and therefore was not equivalent to actively seeking out information about e-cigarettes. Thus, public social media accounts, like TikTok, are not analogous to a website, and therefore, neither factual nor promotional content for e-cigarettes is permitted.

The ASA ordered that the ad not appear again in the form complained about.