More Than Half of Influencer Ads in Portugal Go Unlabelled, by One Nonprofit's AI Count: What the Law Requires and How to Report Them
The #Pub project's AI tracker says 53 percent of influencer posts it classed as advertising were not correctly labelled, and users have sent 40 complaints to ASAE. What Portugal's Advertising Code and the DGC guide require, the fines, and how to report a post.
More than half of the influencer posts that a Portuguese nonprofit's monitoring tool has classed as advertising were not correctly labelled as such. The project, #Pub (Hashtag Pub), says its users have sent 40 complaints to ASAE, the Autoridade de Segurança Alimentar e Económica (Food and Economic Safety Authority), ECO reported on 16 October.
What the tracker counts
#Pub, founded by Diogo Abrantes da Silva, runs an AI tool that checks a sample of Portuguese influencer accounts every day and sorts posts into advertising that is properly identified, advertising that is not, and ordinary content. According to ECO, it covers Instagram and TikTok accounts of influencers working in Portugal with more than 30,000 followers.
The figures on its own monitoring page, as read on 16 October, show 1,024 profiles followed and 2,168 posts assessed from 792 influencers. About 20.2 percent of those posts were advertising, and 53.2 percent of the advertising posts were not correctly identified, a classification the site says 499 user votes have confirmed. It has warned 150 profiles. The first results quoted by ECO, from a slightly smaller sample, put the rate at 52.7 percent.
These are the project's own estimates, not findings by any authority. Users can contest a classification on the site, and the code behind the tool is published as open source.
What the law requires
Article 8 of the Código da Publicidade (Advertising Code, Decree-Law 330/90) says advertising "must be unequivocally identified as such, whatever the medium used". Article 9 bans hidden or disguised advertising.
The Direção-Geral do Consumidor (Directorate-General for Consumers, DGC) spells out what that means online in its "Marketing de Influência" guide, published in October 2025. A post counts as advertising when the influencer is paid in money or in kind: free products, gifts, trips, meals, stays, discounts or loaned items all qualify, as do posts carrying links or discount codes for specific products. The guide asks influencers to:
- state the commercial relationship at the start of the post, in text, audio, image or video;
- use #PUB, #PUBLICIDADE or #ANÚNCIO PUBLICITÁRIO, adding #PATROCINADO for sponsorship, always in Portuguese even if an English label is added;
- use the platforms' own paid partnership tools.
The guide treats a label placed only in the middle or at the end of a post, or hidden behind a "more" link, as bad practice. Reviews must reflect real experience.
Under Article 34, as amended in 2019, breaking Article 8 or 9 is an administrative offence with fines of 1,750 to 3,750 euros for an individual and 3,500 to 45,000 euros for a company. Article 36 holds the advertiser, the agency and anyone else involved in the message liable, so the brand as well as the influencer can be fined.
How to report a post
A follower who suspects an unlabelled advert can complain to ASAE through the queixas e denúncias (complaints) form on its own website, asae.gov.pt; #Pub's site also offers a ready-made complaint email to ASAE for each flagged post. The DGC, which publishes the guide, can be reached on its consumer line, +351 213 564 650. Use only the official channels: ASAE's name has featured in a recent wave of phone scams by fake inspectors.
A Europe-wide problem
Portugal took part in a 2024 check of 576 influencers by the European Commission and national consumer authorities. It found that 97 percent posted commercial content but only 20 percent consistently disclosed it as advertising, and 358 were flagged for follow-up by national authorities.
