Three of the world's largest advertising agencies—WPP, Dentsu, and Publicis—settled with the FTC and eight states over charges they unlawfully colluded since 2018 to steer advertising away from conservative platforms like X and Breitbart by adopting coordinated 'brand safety' standards. The settlement, which still requires federal judge approval, bars the firms from jointly restricting ad placements based on political viewpoints, though individual advertisers can still avoid specific sites. The case turns on an antitrust claim rather than free speech—the FTC argues the collusion distorted the ad-buying market and deprived advertisers of competition between different brand-safety standards. Both sides disputed the underlying premise: the FTC framed this as anticompetitive censorship, while critics argued advertisers have their own free-speech right to choose where ads run.