Ad Exchange Supply Policy

Sovrn strives to provide buyers and sellers with a safe, transparent, and fair marketplace. The following outlines the basic standards Sovrn employs to vet publishers wishing to participate on Sovrn’s ad exchange. This does not constitute a full list and is meant only as a guide for publishers wanting to work with Sovrn.

Sovrn reserves the right to update this list at any time without notice and to refuse or revoke participation of any publisher based on its own judgment.

Site Content Guidelines

Site content will be reviewed upon domain submission for approval, where all review checks must be passed before being admitted to our Exchange.

• safe for work
• must not contain nudity
• must not depict extreme acts of violence
• No hate speech, harassment, bullying, threats, or similar content that advocates for violence or discrimination against any group, organization, or individual
• Content cannot contain disinformation or misinformation, inflammatory politics, or promote adversarial narratives
• Content cannot contain misleading, unsubstantiated, or dangerous health claims, advice, or remedies
• Content must be original and recent
• Site cannot promote the use or acquisition of illegal drugs, substances,firearms or other illegal items
• The domain represented to Sovrn must be a website or web page meeting Traffic Guidelines (outlined below). For example, browser extensions will not be considered a site.
• Site must have text or a mix of written and image-based content; for clarity, site cannot be entirely image-based
• Written content must exhibit a level of effort sufficient to engage a reader base
• Posts must be created frequently, contain a date and time-stamp, and list an author
• Sites must have a reasonable history of content and reader traffic
• Site must indicate user interaction
• Slideshows or list content must contain more content than ads
• Site cannot be directed primarily or exclusively at readers under the age of 16
• File-sharing and the dissemination of pirated or copyrighted material is prohibited
• Site cannot redirect users to unwanted, unexpected, misleading, or malicious websites or contain automatic downloads
• Site must meet all requirements defined in the Master Service Agreement and/or the Exchange terms of service, including (but not limited to) requirements for a publicly posted Privacy Policy and ability to opt-out of targeting.

Ad Inventory Guidelines

The following ad inventory guidelines are the criteria Sovrn uses to define our ad quality standards. All criteria must pass for a domain to be approved for serving ads, and domains will be sampled and audited for continued compliance.

• Page cannot contain more ads or ad space than content
• Site cannot contain pop-ups, pop-unders or redirects
• Site cannot contain inappropriate ads
• Ads cannot be hidden, stacked, obscured, altered, or overlapping
• No more than three (3) ads may be in view at a time
• Ads must be clearly separated from content and declared as ads when embedded in content, using the AdChoices icon
• Ads cannot distribute malware or enable crypto jacking
• Refresh cannot occur more frequently than every 20 seconds
• Site must be compliant with the Coalition for Better Ads’ Initial Better Ads Standards
• Inventory must be clearly marked as a video unit for video ads to be served
• Video content should maintain a reasonable balance between content and advertising (e.g., a 30-second ad should not accompany a video with less than 30-seconds of content)
• Video ads must:
  • not contain auto-play audio
  • play only one video per page at a time
  • not be served within display banner ad units (IBV)
  • not loop or repeat, unless triggered by affirmative action by the reader

Ownership Guidelines

• Publisher must own or have direct control over the domain represented to Sovrn
• Use of black pool sales houses are prohibited
• In cases where an ads.txt file is present, the file must be on the site where ads are served, and the publisher or representative must list Sovrn’s seller ID in the ads.txt file

Traffic Guidelines

• Audience must arrive at the domain primarily from organic sources
• Publishers are prohibited from incentivizing impressions or clicks
• Traffic must meet current minimum quality standards set by Sovrn
• Traffic meets minimum quality standards as measured by Sovrn’s third-party traffic monitoring.