Advertising Council in India Formulates new laws for Crypto exchanges

The recent hype in crypto ads has made the Advertising and Self-Regulating Body ASCI to flag it as "emerging area of concern" and planning to form guidelines for cryptocurrency exchanges.

The organization currently does not have any specific codes regulating this type of advertisement and reports having received complaints about deceptive practices related to cryptocurrencies.

The Advertising Standards Council of India has announced that it will be looking for new ways to protect consumers after the recent request by the Income Tax Department.

The Indian government's previous ruling on cryptocurrencies made trading in this currency illegal, but per Manisha Kapoor, Secretary General at ASCI and head of self-regulatory body said they are working with different stakeholders about fresh guidelines necessary to protect consumer interests as well.

The ASCI has released new guidelines to make advertisements more truthful and informative. Also the existing guidelines stipulates advertisers not be misleading or give false information, but fresh guidelines are being formulated for the same as well.

ASCI Guidelines were created back in 2003 by a group of stakeholders from different sectors: Department Consumer Affairs Ministry; Food Safety Standard Authority of India (FSSAI); AYUSH ministry and Information & Broadcasting( I&B) ministries. These Guidelines go on about how ads shouldn't mislead consumers into buying something they don't need like an expensive product when there is another option available at cheaper price - which is what most people have been doing with their money all these years!

India has recently seen a large number of cryptocurrency exchanges opening up since the country's regulators didn't have any laws in place to govern them. Now, after being summoned by Delhi High Court India is trying to regulate these new markets and make them safer for all investors through advertising guidelines without running standard disclaimers which are otherwise required on most financial products.

The IT department of the country demands trade details from all crypto exchanges. Also they have sent notices to three cryptocurrency exchanges, enquiring about the ledger entries for profits made during this bull run and how many digital coins were sold by these entities.

This isn't the first time that India's government has asked such information - in 2017 they also requested similar data when Bitcoin hit an all-time high of $19,000 USD per coin!

What do you think of this initiative by ASCI? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.