Inventory quality

Index Exchange (“Index", “we”, or “our”) is committed to maintaining an advertising exchange that is made up of brand safe, compliant and fraud-free advertising inventory.

This Inventory quality policy (“Policy”) applies to any party (“Seller A supply partner that sells their own inventory or on behalf of a publisher.”, “you” or “your”) who seeks to have digital advertising inventory contained within websites, mobile applications, streaming video and/or other digital media Properties (collectively “Supply Properties” or “Properties”) available for sale in the Index Exchange marketplace (“Exchange”).

Sellers and their Supply Properties must comply with the guidelines contained in this document (in addition to all applicable laws and regulations). Sellers or Supply Properties that do not meet these standards may be rejected and prevented from participating on the Exchange.

Supply property brand safety review

Index Exchange is a leader in providing a transparent ecosystem for both advertisers and publishers.

To deliver on our values and quality standards, we have a dedicated team of quality control experts who review the content and functionality of all Supply Properties before and after activation on the Exchange. These supply review processes mitigate risks to advertisers by ensuring that Supply Properties are high quality, brand safe, and limit exposure to bad actors and malicious activities.

Supply property ownership

In general, Sellers must either own or have a direct contractual relationship with each Supply Property A point of presence such as a website, social media account, or blog on the web that is an asset of an entity such as an individual or corporation and used for the purpose of representing a brand, person or other identity. whose inventory is eligible to be made available for sale on the Exchange. The specific ownership requirements will differ depending on the type of inventory (e.g., for app, web or STV Streaming TV (STV). Video content that is shown across any device with an internet connection, for example a Connected TV (CTV). inventory). Please contact your Index Representative for specific requirements.

However, at all times you may not make available for sale inventory that is resold, sourced from other intermediaries, or which you do not have a legal right or authority to sell.

Minimum content guidelines

Index Exchange is a leader in providing a high-quality ecosystem for both advertisers and publishers. Supply Properties must contain content that is professional, original, genuine and has a clear purpose other than hosting advertisements.

Abusive experiences

Index Exchange prohibits any Supply Properties that produce abusive experiences to users. This includes, but is not limited to:

  • Auto-redirects on a page, without user action, to a website that is not intended to be visited by the user or not related to the original website;

  • Influencing users’ ability to navigate the Property;

  • Misleading or deceiving users into interacting with advertisements or downloading software;

  • Employing phishing techniques or tricking users into providing sensitive information;

  • Distributing viruses, worms, malware, Trojan horses, spyware, other any other form of unsafe download;

  • Downloading or installing software without user notice and consent, or preventing users from blocking the download or installation of software;

  • Incentivizing clicking on ads or offers, performing searches or visiting websites (note: does not apply to rewarded An opt-in video ad experience, typically in mobile apps, in exchange for which the user receives some type of in-app or in-game currency. video for mobile app inventory); and/or

  • Improperly loading new ads at any time (e.g., without being in view for 30 seconds, or without the page content being substantially updated).

Editorial standards

Supply Properties must appear to be professionally written, contain correct spelling, punctuation and capitalization and be free of grammatical errors, repetition or other similar indicators of low-quality editorial content.

Ad experience

Supply Partner Properties must have a clean aesthetic and may not be dominated by excessive, duplicate or overlapping advertisements. Properties must have an authentic purpose other than advertising arbitrage. While there is no 'hard threshold', as the standard will vary by ad type, a quantity or density of ads that negatively impact Supply Property aesthetic or the user's experience will be rejected by Index Exchange.

Made for advertising

Web Supply Properties must have a primary purpose other than advertising arbitrage, and must contain quality content and create authentic user experiences (i.e., Web Supply Properties may not be Made for Advertising (“MFA”)). MFA generally includes, but is not limited to, generic and low-quality content, that often has a high ad-to-content ratio, rapid auto refreshing of advertisements and a high percentage of paid traffic sourcing.

Our internal review teams analyze Web Supply inventory for the presence of MFA and will reject any Properties that they determine to be MFA.

Supply path optimization

In order to improve bid efficiency for Index Exchange demand-side partners, Index Exchange prioritizes Supply Properties sourced directly from the owner and operator of the Property. Supply Properties sourced from intermediaries which Index Exchange already has access to via an existing Supply Partner (i.e., either directly or indirectly) are subject to additional requirements and may not be permitted in all cases.

Video-specific content standards

Video content must conform to certain additional standards beyond the content standards that apply to all Properties. Supply Property video-based content must:

  • Be hosted within a video player that is clear to the user and not obstructed by other audio or visual elements;

  • Include fully visible features to control the video (e.g., volume, full-screen view, play/pause, etc.); and

  • Have no more than one video playing at a time.

Brand suitability

We believe that all supply content should be professional, respectful and appropriate for our demand partners’ advertisements. To meet these goals, we maintain a list of restricted and prohibited content categories to regulate sensitive content.

Further, Index Exchange requires that Supply Properties follow the Better Ads Standards developed by the Coalition for Better Ads.

Restricted content

Restricted content is sensitive content that may be allowed onto the Exchange if the Supply Property meets Index Exchange’s standards for the particular restricted content category. The standards for each category vary, but in general, the standards include parameters such as compliance with Index Exchange policies, age controls, responsible-use language, and warnings that indicate the nature of the content.

Restricted content includes, but is not limited to, the following:

  • Adult and sexual content;

  • Alcohol, drugs and tobacco;

  • Arms, ammunition and weapons;

  • Controversial, sensitive social or political issues;

  • Death, injury, violence and military conflict;

  • Financial services, foreign exchange, and cryptocurrencies;

  • Gambling;

  • Pharmaceuticals; and

  • User generated content (“UGC”).

Prohibited content

Prohibited content is content that Index Exchange considers to be unacceptable to be represented in any Supply Property on the Exchange, and is described below. Any Supply Properties that are found to contain prohibited content will be immediately removed from the Exchange.

Your Supply Properties may not include content that contains any of the following:

  • Content advocating for criminal activities or other actions that are illegal;

  • Discrimination, harassment and hate speech;

  • Malicious or misleading news content (i.e., news content that contains disinformation, malinformation, or misinformation);

  • Morally reprehensible or obscene content;

  • Online piracy or copyright infringement; and

  • Terrorism.

Additional review of disinformation, malinformation and misinformation

All news-related content on the Exchange is prohibited from including malicious or misleading content (i.e., disinformation, malinformation, misinformation, etc.).

To ensure this standard is met, Index Exchange leverages human review and third-party tools to evaluate the quality of publications for malicious or misleading content. Any content that is found to contain malicious or misleading content will be rejected.

Cryptocurrency and foreign exchange

When an ad or Supply Property related to forex or crypto is submitted to Index Exchange, it is reviewed by our specialized quality control team. To learn more, see Cryptocurrency and foreign exchange guidelines

Industry certification

As part of our commitment to reducing ad fraud, improving the digital advertising experience, and increasing brand safety A safe environment for advertising. Brand safety involves not depicting a brand on a site that contains controversial and/or extremist content, regardless of user engagement., Index Exchange is officially accredited with multiple industry certifications, including the IAB UK Gold Standard 2.1 certification.

Index Exchange has also achieved independent validation conducted by a Trustworthy Accountability Group (TAG) designated auditor for the following TAG certification seals:

  • Certified Against Fraud Seal

  • Certified Against Malware Seal

  • Brand Safety Certified

These seals demonstrate our dedication to combating and preventing invalid traffic, piracy, and malware. They also show our compliance with a clear, common language that describes advertising inventory and transactions across the advertising value chain.

Index Exchange also requires that Seller inventory comply with IAB Digital Advertising Guidelines, including but not limited to IAB Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB). An advertising business organization that develops industry standards, conducts research, and provides legal support for the online advertising industry. standards for ad sizing.

Invalid traffic

IVT scanning

Index Exchange is committed to operating a transparent and clean exchange. To ensure we meet this goal, Index Exchange has partnered with industry-leading third party anti-fraud vendors. Index Exchange leverages these partnerships to scan each advertising opportunity received by our exchange to filter out ad requests originating from bots or fraudulent traffic.

IVT standards

Index Exchange expressly prohibits all Sellers from using artificial means to inflate or target impressions or traffic. Prohibited activities include, but are not limited to:

  • Using automated means to generate an impression;

  • Offering incentives to users to view or interact with an ad (note: does not apply to rewarded video for mobile app inventory);

  • Automatically spawning an impression, or otherwise hijacking a user’s device or browser;

  • Hiding, stacking, covering, or otherwise rendering ads unviewable;

  • Refreshing fewer than every 30 seconds or more than 3 times per page; or

  • Using any other method designed to fraudulently, deceptively, or artificially inflate the number of impressions, clicks, or other measurable actions.

Sellers detected engaging in any of the above may be removed from the Exchange.

Transparency

You must be the authorized seller of the inventory that you make available to Index Exchange. Index Exchange requires that Sellers have implemented ads.txt A file that a publisher provides on their site which lists all of the sellers that are authorized to sell their inventory. Ads.txt adheres to the IAB Tech Lab's Authorized Digital Sellers standard that provides transparency into the supply chain, helps prevent domain spoofing, and disallows unauthorized reselling of inventory. or app-ads.txt A file that a publisher provides on their app which lists all of the sellers that are authorized to sell their inventory. App-ads.txt.txt adheres to the IAB Tech Lab's Authorized Digital Sellers standard that provides transparency into the supply chain, helps prevent domain spoofing, and disallows unauthorized reselling of inventory., and include the Index Exchange entry within the applicable file. This requirement helps to improve transparency into the inventory supply chain, help prevent domain spoofing, and unauthorized reselling of inventory.

To learn more about this policy, see our Ads.txt and app-ads.txt exchange policy.

Any Seller that acts as an intermediary is required to have implemented Sellers.json Sellers.json is a file stored on Index's website that includes the various publishers and intermediaries that Index Exchange works with. in accordance with applicable industry standards. Index will only accept intermediary inventory that is sourced directly from publishers and will leverage sellers.json and (app-)ads.txt files to enforce this requirement.

Privacy

Index Exchange expects Sellers to be forthcoming about how user data is collected and handled. Sellers are prohibited from misusing user data and from collecting data in ways that do not comply with applicable law. Supply Properties must also include a publicly available privacy policy that complies with applicable legislation.

Ongoing monitoring

Although all Supply Properties are carefully reviewed before they are permitted to sell on the Exchange, Index Exchange implements rigorous monitoring processes to ensure that Properties continually meet Index Exchange standards. This includes performing routine scans on all active Properties to detect and manage IVT Invalid traffic (IVT). Traffic entering an exchange that is attempting to present itself as legitimate traffic but is determined to be fraudulent. For example, bot traffic., monitor performance, and ensure ads.txt and policy compliance. Supply Properties and Sellers who are found to be violating our standards are subject to removal from the Exchange.

IVT monitoring

In order to continuously monitor changing fraud risks, Index leverages third-party tools to detect IVT that occurs post-bid.

Index also leverages third-party tools to confirm that advertisements meet Media Rating Council (“MRC”) guidelines for viewability A measure of how often an impression is actually seen by a user. For example, an ad that is served at the bottom of a page that requires a user to scroll to see it will likely have a lower viewability score than an ad that loads at the top of a page., which ensures that advertisements that appear on your Properties have the opportunity to be seen by actual humans.

Performance monitoring

Index Exchange monitors the performance of all Seller inventory on the Exchange to ensure that the inventory meets internal minimum performance thresholds to be viable to transact on the Exchange. The EQ team is responsible for monitoring the performance of your inventory. If Index Exchange determines that your inventory does not meet our established performance standards, we reserve the right to enforce outcomes that include but are not limited to pausing inventory until it meets our standards, or removing it from the Exchange.

Ads.txt and policy compliance

Sellers are required to have implemented ads.txt or app-ads.txt. To enforce this requirement, Index Exchange maintains ads.txt and app-ads.txt monitoring crawlers to validate Seller’s inventory for ads.txt implementation and to check for Index Exchange’s ID. This helps Index Exchange ensure that all inventory is valid and prevent lost revenue opportunities for Sellers due to missing ads.txt files or missing Index Exchange entries. Unauthorized inventory will not be allowed to transact on the Exchange.

Our EQ Team also periodically reviews active Seller inventory for compliance with our quality standards. Any inventory that is found to violate Index Exchange policies may be removed from the Exchange. This helps to ensure that all inventory on the Exchange is high-quality and fraud-free.

Legislative compliance

You are responsible for complying with applicable legislation and ensuring your Supply Properties do not contain content that is illegal.

In the event of a discrepancy between these guidelines and statutory law, statutory law will take precedence.

Ad takedown

Index Exchange will investigate all legitimate advertisement issues that are brought to our attention by Sellers. We recognize the importance of feedback and take all issues submitted to us very seriously and will begin to investigate reported issues within twenty-four (24) hours of receipt.

To submit an ad misplacement issue to Index Exchange, please submit all appropriate and relevant information to your Index Representative.

For more information about our ad misplacement submission and resolution policy, please see Ad misplacement submission and resolution.

Seller Reactivation

Sellers removed from the Exchange by Index Exchange are ineligible for reactivation for a minimum of six (6) months from the removal date. Index Exchange reserves the right to deny any reactivation request at its sole discretion.

Application

Rights reserved

This Policy is not an exhaustive list of prohibitions and restrictions for Sellers, Supply Properties or their inventory. Index Exchange reserves the right to reject, suspend, stop, pause, block or remove any entity from the Exchange at its sole discretion, regardless of whether a basis for removal is listed in this Policy.

Additional information

For more information on our supply quality practices please contact your Index Representative.