Nielsen got some good news this week. The Media Rights Council has reinstated accreditation to the company’s national television ratings. It had been suspended 18 months ago.
The accreditation was revoked because Nielsen’s data was consistently undercounting audiences during the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic.
“Nielsen has undertaken strong efforts to correct the issues that led to its loss of MRC accreditation 19 months ago and to restore key aspects of its panel performance,” George W. Ivie, executive director and CEO of the MRC, said in a statement. “The MRC’s audit has shown these efforts have been successful, and as a result, our TV Committee and board agreed that accreditation should be reinstated.”
The work is not yet done for Nielsen. The company did not get accreditation reinstated for its local television ratings, which are also suspended. Nielsen One, a program designed to measure a show’s audience across multiple platforms, is still under audit.
While the Media Rights Council is satisfied with the improvements, Nielsen has not been without its issues. Earlier this year, a study found that the company’s data undercounted the audience for Super Bowl LVII by twenty percent.
