Italy’s top influencers must register with the government and risk fines of up to €600,000 if they violate a new code of conduct created in the wake of fraud allegations against the country’s biggest social media star.
The crackdown introduced this month covering stealth advertising, sexual content and fake news follows accusations that Chiara Ferragni, the fashion influencer, peddled high-priced pandoro Christmas cakes and Easter eggs to her 28 million followers while falsely claiming that the proceeds went to charity.
Before being engulfed by the scandal known in Italy as “pandoro-gate”, Ferragni was earning an estimated $100,000 for each post, had a Barbie doll named after her and enjoyed a dream marriage to Italy’s best-known rapper Fedez that was turned into a Netflix documentary.
Now she is facing trial in Milan with a verdict expected in January. Ferragni, 38, claims innocence, although she has already paid out €3.4 million as part of a civil fraud case. “It’s a difficult phase in my life and I think you’ll understand if I don’t feel like making any further comments,” she said after a pre-trial hearing last month.
Ferragni
DONATO FASANO/GETTY IMAGES
Pandoro-gate was a catalyst for the creation of the new register and code of conduct for influencers, a source said at Italy’s state communications watchdog Agcom, which drew up the rules.
Under the initiative, any influencer in Italy with more than half a million followers — or who attracts a million views a month — needs to register. Once listed, they must declare when they are being paid to tout a product. “A significant number don’t,” said the source.
Last year, influencers in Italy took in an estimated €352 million from companies to sell their wares.
Other no-no’s include sexual content, the promotion of gambling, cigarettes and alcohol, and the use of AI-generated personalities. Influencers who do not sign up can be fined up to €100,000, while violations of the code can incur fines of up to €600,000.
Under the rules, Ferragni’s alleged pocketing of pandoro proceeds that should have gone to charity might have earned her a €250,000 fine, the source said.
About 600 influencers have signed up already, but some have complained that the entry bar of a million views a month means even influencers with just tens of thousands of followers will have to join.
The Agcom source told the Times that was deliberate. “Niche influencers with only 50,000 followers will often work with companies targeting their particular market,” the source said.
Ferragni may have lost about a million followers since pandoro-gate erupted yet that still leaves her with 28 million and a typical Instagram post this month in which she posed in a revealing dress got nearly 400,000 likes. She and Fedez have divorced.
The Italian journalist Selvaggia Lucarelli, who first accused Ferragni of fraud, said, however, that the influencer had suffered huge damage to her reputation and her pocket. “Her fans had a relationship with her based on trust in her and in her perfect family,” she said. “So to them these allegations feel like a betrayal in the family and that has caused irreparable damage to her image.”