The Inventory is Dark and Full of Misinformation: Understanding Ad Inventory Pooling in the Ad-Tech Supply Chain

Yash Vekaria; Rishab Nithyanand; Zubair Shafiq

doi:10.1109/SP54263.2024.00003

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Conference proceeding

The Inventory is Dark and Full of Misinformation: Understanding Ad Inventory Pooling in the Ad-Tech Supply Chain

Yash Vekaria, Rishab Nithyanand and Zubair Shafiq

2024 IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy (SP), pp.1590-1608

05/19/2024

DOI: 10.1109/SP54263.2024.00003

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Abstract

Ad-tech enables publishers to programmatically sell their ad inventory to millions of demand partners through a complex supply chain. The complexity and opacity of the ad-tech supply chain can be exploited by low-quality publishers (e.g., misinformation websites) to deceptively monetize their ad inventory. To combat such deception, the ad-tech industry has developed transparency standards and brand safety products. In this paper, we show that these developments still fall short of preventing deceptive monetization. Specifically, we focus on how publishers can exploit the ad-tech supply chain, subvert ad-tech transparency standards, and undermine brand safety protections by pooling their ad inventory with unrelated sites. This type of deception is referred to as "dark pooling." Our study shows that dark pooling is commonly employed by misinformation publishers on various major ad exchanges, and allows misinformation publishers to deceptively sell their ad inventory to reputable brands. Our work suggests the need for improved vetting of ad exchange supply partners, the adoption of new ad-tech transparency standards that enable end-to-end validation of the ad-tech supply chain, and the widespread deployment of independent audits like ours.

Ad fraud

Ad inventory

Brand safety

Complexity theory

Dark pooling

Deception

Fake news

Industries

Misinformation

Misinformation monetization

Misrepresentation

Online advertising

Privacy

Protection

Security

Supply chains

Details

Title: Subtitle: The Inventory is Dark and Full of Misinformation: Understanding Ad Inventory Pooling in the Ad-Tech Supply Chain
Creators: Yash Vekaria - University of California, Davis
Rishab Nithyanand - University of Iowa
Zubair Shafiq - University of California, Davis
Resource Type: Conference proceeding
Publication Details: 2024 IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy (SP), pp.1590-1608
Publisher: IEEE
DOI: 10.1109/SP54263.2024.00003
eISSN: 2375-1207
Grant note: National Science Foundation (10.13039/100000001)
Language: English
Date published: 05/19/2024
Academic Unit: Law Faculty; Computer Science; Center for Social Science Innovation
Record Identifier: 9984702957002771

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