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The last thing that advertisers and publishers want is for their ads and sites to be used for nefarious purposes. Yet, 1 in every 500 ads falls victim to cybercriminals and bad actors. How do we prevent this from happening? In this post, we cover what malvertising is and what went into becoming Confiant’s most secure SSP.
What is “Malvertising?”
Malvertising, or malicious advertising, is when bad actors covertly place malicious code on an advertising creative which hijacks the ad into one of many online scams and viruses. Once the harmful code is snuck onto the ad creative, it can go undetected through the bidstream before landing on the publisher’s site and on a user’s device.
For example, advertisers’ and brands’ spend can go to waste on unseen ads through malicious ad stacking. Ad stacking is when a fake, harmful ad is placed on top of a legitimate ad. To the publisher, it looks as if the advertiser’s or brand’s ad is displayed, but to users, it could be a totally different ad that can contain viruses or other malware. Furthermore, publishers can have their site reputation tarnished from malware forcefully redirecting users to a cybercriminal’s webpage. From there, users can fall prey to phishing scams that look like real advertisements, but instead, have their information stolen by bad actors.
Sharethrough Ranked #1 In Security
Every 6 months, Confiant releases a Malvertising and Ad Quality Index (MAQ) to highlight new and impactful malvertising schemes while also comparing the security and quality of their SSP partners.
Confiant also releases quarterly reports to each of their clients. In the latest quarterly report (Q3 2022), Sharethrough was deemed to be the SSP with the lowest security violation rate of all of the SSPs tracked!
Bad actors and cybercriminals can insert ad creatives with malicious code into the bidstream, which can lay dormant for hours or days until after the ad has already passed security checks throughout the bidstream. A way to counter this would be for Sharethrough to scan every single ad creative every time it runs, but that uses up many resources and clogs up the bidstream. So how do we effectively prevent malvertising from reaching publishers and users?
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How We Did It
We knew that stopping malvertising in its tracks on the Sharethrough Exchange would take a combined effort between Sharethrough and a partner who specializes in anti-malvertising. We decided that Confiant was that company, because of their reputation in the industry for a highly effective, robust SSP solution. Working together, the teams created interfaces linking the Sharethrough Exchange to the Confiant SSP solution.
The Confiant service connects to the Sharethrough Exchange, actively scanning ad creatives using only Confiant resources, so it doesn’t impact or slow down the Sharethrough bidstream. Because an ad can start out clean, but later be swapped out for an infected or cloaked ad using targeted code, this service tracks the creatives continuously, never assuming that because it passed prior inspections that it is safe now.
After we integrated our service to Confiant, we used the feedback to actively police issues and weed out the bad apples. Confiant is able to tell us through their advanced API systems and algorithms whether an ad creative is infected with malicious code or cloaked. If an ad creative is flagged as malicious we remove the creative before it can make its way to the publisher’s site and the user’s devices. After optimization, we were able to act on issue detections fast enough to become this quarter’s #1 ranked SSP for security.
Safe with Sharethrough
In a time when malvertising can strike at any moment, Sharethrough and Confiant work together to help prevent harmful ads from hurting a publisher’s site reputation, in addition to keeping advertisers’ spend from going to waste on unseen/hijacked creatives. Furthermore, consumers are kept safe from viruses and scams hiding behind malvertising.
Contact us for more information on how Sharethrough can keep your ads and site safe.
The last thing that advertisers and publishers want is for their ads and sites to be used for nefarious purposes. Yet, 1 in every 500 ads falls victim to cybercriminals and bad actors. How do we prevent this from happening? In this post, we cover what malvertising is and what went into becoming Confiant’s most secure SSP.
What is “Malvertising?”
Malvertising, or malicious advertising, is when bad actors covertly place malicious code on an advertising creative which hijacks the ad into one of many online scams and viruses. Once the harmful code is snuck onto the ad creative, it can go undetected through the bidstream before landing on the publisher’s site and on a user’s device.
For example, advertisers’ and brands’ spend can go to waste on unseen ads through malicious ad stacking. Ad stacking is when a fake, harmful ad is placed on top of a legitimate ad. To the publisher, it looks as if the advertiser’s or brand’s ad is displayed, but to users, it could be a totally different ad that can contain viruses or other malware. Furthermore, publishers can have their site reputation tarnished from malware forcefully redirecting users to a cybercriminal’s webpage. From there, users can fall prey to phishing scams that look like real advertisements, but instead, have their information stolen by bad actors.
Sharethrough Ranked #1 In Security
Every 6 months, Confiant releases a Malvertising and Ad Quality Index (MAQ) to highlight new and impactful malvertising schemes while also comparing the security and quality of their SSP partners.
Confiant also releases quarterly reports to each of their clients. In the latest quarterly report (Q3 2022), Sharethrough was deemed to be the SSP with the lowest security violation rate of all of the SSPs tracked!
Bad actors and cybercriminals can insert ad creatives with malicious code into the bidstream, which can lay dormant for hours or days until after the ad has already passed security checks throughout the bidstream. A way to counter this would be for Sharethrough to scan every single ad creative every time it runs, but that uses up many resources and clogs up the bidstream. So how do we effectively prevent malvertising from reaching publishers and users?
How We Did It
We knew that stopping malvertising in its tracks on the Sharethrough Exchange would take a combined effort between Sharethrough and a partner who specializes in anti-malvertising. We decided that Confiant was that company, because of their reputation in the industry for a highly effective, robust SSP solution. Working together, the teams created interfaces linking the Sharethrough Exchange to the Confiant SSP solution.
The Confiant service connects to the Sharethrough Exchange, actively scanning ad creatives using only Confiant resources, so it doesn’t impact or slow down the Sharethrough bidstream. Because an ad can start out clean, but later be swapped out for an infected or cloaked ad using targeted code, this service tracks the creatives continuously, never assuming that because it passed prior inspections that it is safe now.
After we integrated our service to Confiant, we used the feedback to actively police issues and weed out the bad apples. Confiant is able to tell us through their advanced API systems and algorithms whether an ad creative is infected with malicious code or cloaked. If an ad creative is flagged as malicious we remove the creative before it can make its way to the publisher’s site and the user’s devices. After optimization, we were able to act on issue detections fast enough to become this quarter’s #1 ranked SSP for security.
Safe with Sharethrough
In a time when malvertising can strike at any moment, Sharethrough and Confiant work together to help prevent harmful ads from hurting a publisher’s site reputation, in addition to keeping advertisers’ spend from going to waste on unseen/hijacked creatives. Furthermore, consumers are kept safe from viruses and scams hiding behind malvertising.
Contact us for more information on how Sharethrough can keep your ads and site safe.
Behind Headlines: 180 Seconds in Ad Tech is a short 3-minute podcast exploring the news in the digital advertising industry. Ad tech is a fast-growing industry with many updates happening daily. As it can be hard for most to keep up with the latest news, the Sharethrough team wanted to create an audio series compiling notable mentions each week.
The last thing that advertisers and publishers want is for their ads and sites to be used for nefarious purposes. Yet, 1 in every 500 ads falls victim to cybercriminals and bad actors. How do we prevent this from happening? In this post, we cover what malvertising is and what went into becoming Confiant’s most secure SSP.
What is “Malvertising?”
Malvertising, or malicious advertising, is when bad actors covertly place malicious code on an advertising creative which hijacks the ad into one of many online scams and viruses. Once the harmful code is snuck onto the ad creative, it can go undetected through the bidstream before landing on the publisher’s site and on a user’s device.
For example, advertisers’ and brands’ spend can go to waste on unseen ads through malicious ad stacking. Ad stacking is when a fake, harmful ad is placed on top of a legitimate ad. To the publisher, it looks as if the advertiser’s or brand’s ad is displayed, but to users, it could be a totally different ad that can contain viruses or other malware. Furthermore, publishers can have their site reputation tarnished from malware forcefully redirecting users to a cybercriminal’s webpage. From there, users can fall prey to phishing scams that look like real advertisements, but instead, have their information stolen by bad actors.
Sharethrough Ranked #1 In Security
Every 6 months, Confiant releases a Malvertising and Ad Quality Index (MAQ) to highlight new and impactful malvertising schemes while also comparing the security and quality of their SSP partners.
Confiant also releases quarterly reports to each of their clients. In the latest quarterly report (Q3 2022), Sharethrough was deemed to be the SSP with the lowest security violation rate of all of the SSPs tracked!
Bad actors and cybercriminals can insert ad creatives with malicious code into the bidstream, which can lay dormant for hours or days until after the ad has already passed security checks throughout the bidstream. A way to counter this would be for Sharethrough to scan every single ad creative every time it runs, but that uses up many resources and clogs up the bidstream. So how do we effectively prevent malvertising from reaching publishers and users?
How We Did It
We knew that stopping malvertising in its tracks on the Sharethrough Exchange would take a combined effort between Sharethrough and a partner who specializes in anti-malvertising. We decided that Confiant was that company, because of their reputation in the industry for a highly effective, robust SSP solution. Working together, the teams created interfaces linking the Sharethrough Exchange to the Confiant SSP solution.
The Confiant service connects to the Sharethrough Exchange, actively scanning ad creatives using only Confiant resources, so it doesn’t impact or slow down the Sharethrough bidstream. Because an ad can start out clean, but later be swapped out for an infected or cloaked ad using targeted code, this service tracks the creatives continuously, never assuming that because it passed prior inspections that it is safe now.
After we integrated our service to Confiant, we used the feedback to actively police issues and weed out the bad apples. Confiant is able to tell us through their advanced API systems and algorithms whether an ad creative is infected with malicious code or cloaked. If an ad creative is flagged as malicious we remove the creative before it can make its way to the publisher’s site and the user’s devices. After optimization, we were able to act on issue detections fast enough to become this quarter’s #1 ranked SSP for security.
Safe with Sharethrough
In a time when malvertising can strike at any moment, Sharethrough and Confiant work together to help prevent harmful ads from hurting a publisher’s site reputation, in addition to keeping advertisers’ spend from going to waste on unseen/hijacked creatives. Furthermore, consumers are kept safe from viruses and scams hiding behind malvertising.
Contact us for more information on how Sharethrough can keep your ads and site safe.
Founded in 2015, Calibrate is a yearly conference for new engineering managers hosted by seasoned engineering managers. The experience level of the speakers ranges from newcomers all the way through senior engineering leaders with over twenty years of experience in the field. Each speaker is greatly concerned about the craft of engineering management. Organized and hosted by Sharethrough, it was conducted yearly in September, from 2015-2019 in San Francisco, California.
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