An influencer and former Love Island contestant has been found to have breached UK advertising rules by not properly labelling a TikTok post as an ad.
Tasha Ghouri was paid by EMI Records, a division of Universal Music Operations Ltd, to feature Hold me Closer by Elton John and Britney Spears in a TikTok video but it was not sufficiently clear the post was an ad, the advertising regulator said.
The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) said merely posting “soundad” did not make it clear the post and the soundtrack was paid for brand marketing.
The common hashtag, used to delineate sponsored soundtracks from standard video sounds, could be interpreted as a misspelling of “sounded”, the watchdog said.
It was also “unlikely” that all UK TikTok users would understand the meaning of the label “soundad”, it added.
Another factor was the location of “soundad” in the post’s caption. The “ad” part of the label was insufficiently prominent, the ASA found.
The video was uploaded on 3 November and is a montage of Ms Ghouri’s work and general life, accompanied by a caption which reads: “(heart emoji) #TinyDancer #HoldMeCloser soundad”.
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A further caption says “(music note symbol) Hold Me Closer – Joel Corry Remix – Elton John & Britney Spears”.
Text at the beginning of the video says “POV [point of view]: you’re doing what you’re passionate about”. On the next line it says “Using my voice (heart emoji)”.
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The video was still accessible on TikTok on Tuesday evening with the language outlined in the ruling, despite the ASA banning the ad.
The ASA ruling said: “The ad must not appear again in the form complained of.”
“We told Universal Music Operations Ltd and Tasha Ghouri to ensure that their future posts were obviously identifiable as marketing communications, including where the audio content of a post was advertising, for example, by including a clear and prominent identifier such as “#ad” at a minimum.”
Aside from the song the content of the TikTok reel was not sponsored. The amount Ms Ghouri received for the ad was not disclosed.
In response to the complaint, which the regulator upheld, Ms Ghouri, said the caption clearly stated “soundad” in the first line which she believed was more than sufficient to identify the track as an ad.
EMI Records said it was their standard practice when working with influencers to ask for the “musicad” or “soundad” tag to be used. They believed that was an appropriate and obvious way to identify when an influencer had been paid to use a piece of music.
Ms Ghouri appeared in season 8 of Love Island in 2022 which was won by Ekin Su Cülcüloğlu and Davide Sanclimenti.. She was the first deaf person to appear on the show.
In addition to working as an ambassador for fashion and beauty brands, Ms Ghouri began work on a podcast in February.
Her TikTok page had 820.9K followers, 20.5m likes as of 18 April.
BST Hyde Park festival has cancelled its final night after Jeff Lynne’s Electric Light Orchestra pulled out of the headline slot.
Lynne, 77, was due to play alongside his band on Sunday but has been forced to withdraw from the event following a “systemic infection”.
The London show was supposed to be a “final goodbye” from ELO following their farewell US tour.
Organisers said on Saturday that Lynne was “heartbroken” at being unable to perform.
A statement read: “Jeff has been battling a systemic infection and is currently in the care of a team of doctors who have advised him that performing is simply not possible at this time nor will he be able to reschedule.
“The legacy of the band and his longtime fans are foremost in Jeff’s mind today – and while he is so sorry that he cannot perform, he knows that he must focus on his health and rehabilitation at this time.”
They later confirmed the whole of Sunday’s event would be cancelled.
“Ticket holders will be refunded and contacted directly by their ticket agent with further details,” another statement said.
Stevie Wonder played the festival on Saturday – now its final event of 2025.
US rock band The Doobie Brothers and blues rock singer Steve Winwood were among those who had been due to perform to before ELO’s headline performance.
The cancellation comes after the band, best known for their hit Mr Blue Sky, pulled out of a performance due to take place at Manchester’s Co-Op Live Arena on Thursday.
ELO was formed in Birmingham in 1970 by Lynne, multi-instrumentalist Roy Wood and drummer Bev Bevan.
They first split in 1986, before frontman Lynne resurrected the band in 2014.
Donald Trump has said he is considering “taking away” the US citizenship of actress and comedian Rosie O’Donnell, despite a Supreme Court ruling that expressly prohibits a government from doing so.
In a post on Truth Social on Saturday, the US president said: “Because of the fact that Rosie O’Donnell is not in the best interests of our Great Country, I am giving serious consideration to taking away her Citizenship.”
He also labelled O’Donnell, who has moved to Ireland, as a “threat to humanity” and said she should “remain in the wonderful country of Ireland, if they want her”.
O’Donnell responded on Instagram by posting a photograph of Mr Trump with Jeffrey Epstein.
“You are everything that is wrong with America and I’m everything you hate about what’s still right with it,” she wrote in the caption.
“I’m not yours to silence. I never was.”
Image: Rosie O’Donnell moved to Ireland after Donald Trump secured a second term. Pic: AP
O’Donnell moved to Ireland with her 12-year-old son in January after Mr Trump had secured a second term.
She has said she’s in the process of obtaining Irish citizenship based on family lineage and that she would only return to the US “when it is safe for all citizens to have equal rights there in America”.
O’Donnell and the US president have criticised each other publicly for years, in an often-bitter back-and-forth that predates Mr Trump’s move into politics.
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This is just the latest threat by the president to revoke the citizenship of someone he has disagreed with, most recently his former ally Elon Musk.
But the two situations are different as while Musk was born in South Africa, O’Donnell was born in the US and has a constitutional right to American citizenship.
Amanda Frost, a law professor at the University of Virginia School of Law, said the Supreme Court ruled in a 1967 case that the fourteenth amendment of the constitution prevents the government from taking away citizenship.
“The president has no authority to take away the citizenship of a native-born US citizen,” he added.
“In short, we are nation founded on the principle that the people choose the government; the government cannot choose the people.”
The Salt Path author Raynor Winn’s fourth book has been delayed by her publisher.
It comes amid claims that the author lied about her story in her hit first book. Winn previously described the claims as “highly misleading” and called suggestions that her husband had Moth made up his illness “utterly vile”.
In a statement, Penguin Michael Joseph, said it had delayed the publication of Winn’s latest book On Winter Hill – which had been set for release 23 October.
The publisher said the decision had been made in light of “recent events, in particular intrusive conjecture around Moth’s health”, which it said had caused “considerable distress” to the author and her family.
“It is our priority to support the author at this time,” the publisher said.
“With this in mind, Penguin Michael Joseph, together with the author, has made the decision to delay the publication of On Winter Hill from this October.”
A new release date will be announced in due course, the publisher added.
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Winn’s first book, released in 2018, detailed the journey she and husband took along the South West Coast Path – familiarly known as The Salt Path – after they lost their family farm and Moth received a terminal health diagnosis of Corticobasal Degeneration (CBD).
But a report in The Observer disputed key aspects of the 2018 “true” story – which was recently turned into a film starring Jason Isaacs and Gillian Anderson.
Image: Raynor and husband Moth (centre) with actors Jason Isaacs (L) and Gillian Anderson (R). Pic: Steve Tanner/Black Bear
Experts ‘sceptical of health claims’
As part of the article, published last weekend, The Observer claimed to have spoken to experts who were “sceptical” about elements of Moth’s terminal diagnosis, such as a “lack of acute symptoms and his apparent ability to reverse them”.
In the ensuing controversy, PSPA, a charity that supports people with CBD, cut ties with the couple.
The Observer article also claimed the portrayal of a failed investment in a friend’s business wasn’t true, but said the couple – whose names are Sally and Tim Walker – lost their home after Raynor Winn embezzled money from her employer and had to borrow to pay it back and avoid police action.
Image: Anderson played Winn in a movie about the couple’s journey. Pic: Steve Tanner/Black Bear
It also said that, rather than being homeless, the couple had owned a house in France since 2007.
Winn’s statement said the dispute with her employer wasn’t the reason the couple lost their home – but admitted she may have made “mistakes” while in the job.
“For me it was a pressured time,” she wrote. “It was also a time when mistakes were being made in the business. Any mistakes I made during the years in that office, I deeply regret, and I am truly sorry.”
She admitted being questioned by police but said she wasn’t charged.
The author also said accusations that Moth lied about having CBD/CBS were false and had “emotionally devastated” him.
“I have charted Moth’s condition with such a level of honesty, that this is the most unbearable of the allegations,” Winn wrote on her website.