FCC to investigate unlabeled ads

FCC Chairman Kevin Martin ordered a probe of dozens of television stations after a report by the nonprofit Center for Media and Democracy found they aired advertisements as if they were news reports. The April study found at least 77 stations, including seven each owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group Inc. and Tribune Co., ignored an FCC warning to disclose sponsors. The FCC warned TV stations in April 2005 they may be fined for airing news stories provided by the government and companies without disclosing who made them. Since then, 69 stations have aired video news releases and eight showed satellite media tours. Stations in 30 states aired the video ads, the study found. News Corp.'s Fox News and CBS Corp. each own six of the stations that aired the ads without disclosure. Twenty-three are affiliates of Walt Disney Co.'s ABC network. A Sinclair-owned station in Oklahoma City, for example, aired five video releases exactly as prepared by their corporate publicist as if they were news reports, the research group said. Hunt Valley, MD-based Sinclair owns 60 television stations in the US, including Asheville, NC's WLOS. Burbank, CA-based Disney's ABC has 226 affiliates in the US. Among the companies that sponsored the video news releases in the study were General Motors Corp., the world's largest automaker and Intel Corp., the biggest maker of semiconductors.