IDC has reported that online advertising contracted 5% worldwide in the second quarter, while United States witnessed a drop of 7% in online ad spending during the same period.

According to IDC, spending on Internet ads was recorded at $13.9 billion, down from $14.7 billion in the same quarter a year ago.

Online ad spending in United States plunges to $6.2 billion in Q2. Spending on display ads dropped 12%, while spending on classifieds took a dive of 17%.

Asia, the Pacific and Japan were the exceptions as these regions saw a slight gain in the spending on online ads in the most recent quarter.

IDC expects US advertisers to decrease their online ad spending in the third quarter of 2009.

The Monster. com was among the worst affected, which saw a fall of 31% in online ad sales.

But Google became the exception as it reported a slight growth.

IDC's director of digital media & entertainment, Karsten Weide said, "Industry may have to wait until mid-2010 until it sees real growth again."