The public service broadcaster engaged in a "serious breach" of industry standards by failing to disclose that the narrator of a documentary about the Gaza conflict was the child of a Hamas administrator, as determined by regulatory body Ofcom.
An probe by the media regulator into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the film was "substantially inaccurate".
The BBC's director general had earlier expressed regret, noting there had been "a significant failing in relation to factual correctness".
The authority has ordered the corporation to broadcast a evening statement about its findings.
"Since this amounts to a serious breach of our regulations, we are directing the corporation to broadcast a message of our findings against it on the BBC's second channel at 21:00, with a schedule to be determined," the statement read.
'Potential to Erode Confidence'
The watchdog's statement said: "Our investigation determined that the programme's lack of disclosure that the narrator's male guardian served in a role in the Hamas-administered authority was significantly deceptive.
"It meant that the public did not have essential details which may have been highly relevant to their judgment of the narrator and the content he presented.
"Confidence is at the center of the connection between a broadcaster and its public, particularly for a state-funded media outlet such as the public broadcaster.
"This failing had the potential to erode the significantly high degrees of confidence that audiences would have invested in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Gaza conflict."
The programme was removed from iPlayer in last February after the narrator's familial connections came to light, and in this past July an broadcaster's internal assessment concluded it infringed the organization's journalistic standards on truthfulness.
A corporation official said: "The regulator's decision is in line with the conclusions of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a significant failing in the film in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on accuracy, which reflects regulation 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We expressed regret for this and we accept Ofcom's decision in full. We will comply with the sanction as soon as the date and wording are finalised."
