Artificial intelligence has crossed a critical threshold in advertising.
The problem is no longer that AI-generated images and videos look fake. The problem is that AI advertising now looks better than reality — more perfect, more persuasive, and increasingly indistinguishable from real photography and film.
In UK commercial advertising, this shift raises serious questions about consumer trust, truthful marketing, and the future of the creative industries. Without clear regulation and mandatory AI disclosure, AI-generated advertising imagery risks becoming fundamentally misleading, even when no explicit false claims are made.
This is why the UK urgently needs clear, enforceable rules requiring the labelling of AI-generated images and AI-generated video used in advertising.
Artificial Intelligence Has Changed Advertising Faster Than Regulation
AI-generated content has moved rapidly from novelty to mainstream advertising tool. Brands can now create hyper-realistic visuals without a camera, a product, a studio, or a physical shoot. Entire advertising campaigns can be generated synthetically, optimised for attention rather than accuracy.
UK advertising standards were built on the assumption that images, however stylised, were based on something real — a photographed object, a filmed performance, a physical space. AI disrupts that assumption entirely.
When advertising imagery no longer requires a real-world reference, consumers lose the context needed to make informed decisions. This is not simply a creative issue; it is a consumer protection issue.
The End of Visual Truth in Commercial Advertising
For decades, advertising has operated under an implicit agreement with audiences. Images could be enhanced, retouched or art-directed, but they ultimately represented something that existed.
AI-generated advertising breaks that agreement.
AI visuals are not constrained by physics, manufacturing limits, biology or logistics. They can depict products with impossible proportions, unrealistic textures and idealised perfection that no real-world process can achieve.
When an AI-generated image is presented without disclosure, viewers reasonably assume they are seeing a photographed product. In reality, they may be seeing a synthetic simulation designed purely to persuade.
At that point, visual advertising stops being representational and becomes speculative — and consumers are no longer able to judge what is real.
AI Food Advertising: The Clearest Case of Consumer Deception
Food advertising highlights this problem more clearly than almost any other category.
AI-generated burgers, pizzas and desserts can appear juicier, fresher and more structurally perfect than anything that could be cooked, assembled or served. These images are not food styling; they are fictional constructs.
Consumers reasonably expect food advertising images to represent a real product that can be purchased and eaten as shown. When AI-generated food images are used without clear labelling, they create misleading expectations, even if accompanying copy is technically accurate.
Under UK consumer protection law, this undermines informed purchasing decisions, weakens trust in advertising standards, and creates unfair competition between brands using real photography and those using synthetic imagery.
When AI Is “Better Than Reality,” Competition Breaks
Unregulated AI advertising creates perverse incentives.
If one brand uses AI-generated perfection:
- Competitors feel forced to follow
- Real photography and filming are penalised
- Authentic representation becomes commercially unviable
This accelerates a race where:
- Reality loses
- Trust erodes
- Consumers are conditioned to expect the impossible
Once this becomes normalised, truthful representation itself becomes uncompetitive.
Transparency Is Not a Ban — It’s a Safeguard
Requiring a simple disclosure such as:
“AI-generated image” or “AI-generated video”
does not restrict creativity or innovation.
It:
- Preserves consumer autonomy
- Restores context to visual claims
- Allows AI to be used ethically and responsibly
- Aligns with existing UK advertising principles of honesty and fairness
This is not anti-AI policy.
It is pro-transparency, pro-consumer, and pro-trust.
Protecting Jobs in the UK Creative Industries
The UK’s film, television, photography, advertising, and creative sectors employ millions of people and contribute billions to the economy.
Unchecked AI advertising threatens:
- Photographers
- Film crews
- Stylists
- Actors
- Set designers
- Editors
- Production companies
When AI-generated visuals can replace entire productions without disclosure, it devalues skilled labour and collapses ethical competition.
Clear labelling does not stop AI use — but it prevents silent replacement and allows clients and consumers to make informed choices about authenticity.
Why Existing UK Advertising Law Is No Longer Enough
The UK’s advertising framework was not designed for:
- Synthetic humans
- Entirely fabricated products
- Hyper-real visuals with no physical reference
Without explicit AI disclosure rules, enforcement bodies such as the ASA are forced to interpret outdated standards in a new technological reality.
That gap must be closed — now, not after trust has already collapsed.
A Call for a UK Parliament Petition on AI Advertising Disclosure
To safeguard consumers, creativity, and truth in advertising, the UK should introduce legislation requiring that:
Any AI-generated image or video used for commercial advertising purposes must be clearly and prominently labelled as AI-generated.
This should apply across:
- Food and drink advertising
- Consumer products
- Fashion and beauty
- Travel and lifestyle promotions
- Digital, print, and broadcast media
Such legislation would:
- Strengthen consumer protection
- Preserve honest competition
- Support creative employment
- Future-proof UK advertising standards
Conclusion: Why Transparency in AI-Generated Advertising Is Essential for Consumer Trust
When AI is better than reality, seeing is no longer believing.
In that world, transparency is not optional — it is infrastructure.
If we want a future where consumers can trust what they see, where creativity is valued, and where innovation does not come at the cost of honesty, then AI-generated advertising must be clearly disclosed.
The future is arriving fast.
The rules need to arrive faster.
