Baca COO Jimmy Sie explained what actually happened –and the steps that they are taking to handle it
Indonesian news aggregator app Baca recently found itself in the middle of a controversy when netizens slammed the startup for using violent and pornographic content in their digital advertisement, an incident that peaked with the Baca app disappearing from the Google Play Store.
Today, Baca COO Jimmy Sie finally spoke up about the issues.
He began by stating that the company is working with more than 30 digital marketing agencies to develop and execute the advertisement plan, and that the indecent content was “beyond the company’s control” and approval.
“We and the digital marketing agencies have agreed that they can only publish an advertisement under our consent. But in practice, the agreement has been violated, leading to the advertisement that had led to the unwanted reaction,” he wrote in a statement.
He also stated that the company is committed to perform stricter control against the agencies that they are working with, and that it had cut ties with those that had violated the agreement.
“We always try to build a conducive digital world … We never meant to intentionally published indecent news, whether it is pornographic or violent. All news are being published in the right proportion, strictly adhering to norms and ethics,” he added.
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Sie also explained that the app’s disappearance from Google Play Store was also related to the advertisement incident, combined with some ‘technical issues with Google Play Store.’
“We have talked to Google and explained in detail the chronology and the facts behind the indecent ad case. As for the technical violation on Google’s policy, we duly received the advice given by Google and had performed refinements on our app, in accordance to Google’s policy,” he said.
The startup stated that Google has republished the app back into Play Store.
“We deeply apologised to every parties that have been wronged [by this incident]. We are going to do better to build a safer and more beneficial digital world for everyone,” Sie closed.
The post Baca finally speaks up on indecent advertisement, disappearing app issue appeared first on e27.