The lack of ad compliance and bad quality ads are highly damaging for ad serving platforms and this is why AdSecure and EXADS have taken measures to prevent this from happening to EXADS clients. To get a better understanding of how platforms and the end users can be affected, let’s take a look at two possible scenarios:

In the first scenario, we consider an ad network, serving ads to their publisher network, without checking the ad campaign and landing page URLs before or after launch. Behind this campaign, we have a malicious advertiser who injected a code into the campaign, once he wins the bids for the publisher ad zones. Oblivious of this, the ad network allows the campaign to run. An end user clicks on the ad and is immediately served a pop up telling them their device is infected with viruses and locks access to the end user’s files on the device. The end user is asked for money in exchange for unlocking their device. This is called Scareware or Ransomware.

As a result, the end user will never visit the publisher’s site again due to this bad experience and may end up having to pay the ransom. The reputations of both Publisher and Ad Network reputation are damaged, leading to a loss of revenue.

For the second scenario, let’s consider a Publisher who is not monitoring the quality of ads being served and checking if the advertisers’ ad creatives meet the IAB industry standards. The banner campaign images that are showing on his sites, are not the correct pixel size so they appear squashed to the end user, in addition the ad creative is heavier than the recommended size by the IAB.

Consequently, the end user is unlikely to click on the image banner as it does not look legitimate or is not attractive to click on. This results in a very low click through rate (CTR). Because the ad is ‘heavy’ it will slow down the load time of the Publishers page, which could lead to penalization from Google and could affect the Publishers Google ranking.

Google implemented the Heavy Ad Intervention on Chrome 84 and above. According to this new policy, when a Heavy Ad is detected, it gets blocked by Google, meaning the ad isn’t displayed to the end user, resulting in a loss of revenue for the advertiser and the publisher.

Automated ad compliance

Even if you have a dedicated Compliance team manually checking campaigns you could be dealing with thousands of campaigns to check and approve each day. An automated solution can help a Compliance team to scan all your ad campaigns. That solution is to use AdSecure’s 360 degree monitoring and protection for your ad supply chain which helps you automate your ad verification process before ad campaigns go live & while they are running.

AdSecure detects over 40 violations including:

• User Security Violations such as Adware, Browser Locker, Drive-by Crypto Mining, Malware, Scareware, Ransomware, etc
• User Experience Violations including Auto-downloads, Back Button Hijack, Landing Page Error, Device Permission Requests, etc
• User Advisory Violations including Heavy Ad, Suspicious TLD, Unsafe Content, IAB Standards, etc

See a full list of our detections here.

EXADS and AdSecure’s partnership

EXADS offers its clients AdSecure as a way to better manage the security and the safety of the ads that they serve. Because AdSecure has a ready made API, it was easy and straightforward for EXADS to integrate this into their platform. The API provides automatic and real-time solutions in order to help EXADS’ clients improve the integrity of their networks and offer instant protections to each Ad Network’s Publisher clients, which in turn protects their end users against malvertising threats, non-compliant ads and ensure only high quality, industry standard ads are shown.

Many of EXADS’ clients don’t have the resources to offer a complete Compliance solution. The pre-existing integration of AdSecure’s API allows clients to benefit from having a full malvertising and ad quality control system. AdSecure scans ad campaigns before they launch and while the campaigns are running, to detect in real-time any type of violation using their industry leading arsenal of detection solutions. EXADS’ clients now have the tools to reject, suspend and monitor all their ad campaigns for malicious activity.

How AdSecure addresses ad compliance needs

AdSecure’s callback and API ability has enabled EXADS to automate the way that their clients can stop malvertising threats. When issues are detected, via the API callback system, campaigns are rejected automatically and instantaneously. Additionally, AdSecure’s ability to detect all forms of malvertising, bad practices and ads that do not meet the industry’s IAB standards ensures that EXADS is realizing its ambition to provide a safe and secure experience for both ad related businesses and end users.

Because of EXADS partnership with AdSecure, EXADS can offer a complete client integration with a flexible API callback system that is tailored to each client’s requirements including:

• Automatic scanning of ads
• Real-time detection of malvertising
• Real-time detection of unsafe content and non-compliant ad creatives
• Ability to automatically apply relevant labels to ads
• Ability to automatically block and remove problematic ads
• Ability to automatically suspend offending advertisers
• Automatic violation alert notifications system

Essentially, through the API and callback system, EXADS clients have a flexible and tailor made system that can define what violations they want AdSecure to detect, what automatic actions they want EXADS to take on different violation types and identify which ad campaigns and advertisers are causing violations. This offers EXADS’ clients the ability to take down offending ads automatically, instantly saving time and resources in the process.

EXADS Product Director, Barry O’Sullivan explains, "EXADS chose to work with AdSecure because their technology is the most up to date in the industry. This was very important to us, because cyber criminals spend everyday using technology to develop new ways to exploit end users for financial gain. We want to ensure that our clients have the best tools at hand to detect any malicious activity on their networks. AdSecure’s API integration is easy and customisable in order to meet each client’s individual needs and it works in real-time, giving clients full control over their ad supply chain. Working with AdSecure has lifted our SaaS platform way ahead of our competitors by offering a fully comprehensive ad compliance solution to our clients."

DMEXCO, Cologne, Germany September 21- 22

Both EXADS and AdSecure will be exhibiting at DMEXCO, visit our stand at Hall 06.1 Stand E-040 or book a meeting at the show with AdSecure’s Customer Success Manager Guandi Bai here.