IAB Tech Lab is excited to announce the finalized specification for the Accountability Platform – a specification designed to foster transparency and trust within the digital advertising ecosystem. As digital advertising continues to evolve, the need for robust mechanisms to validate user preference signals has never been more critical. The Accountability Platform aims to provide a consistent framework that all industry participants can rely on to evaluate the integrity and completeness of these communications.
The Vision Behind the Accountability Platform
The Accountability Platform was developed with two primary goals in mind:
- Ensuring Correctness of Communication of User Preference Signals: By validating that user preference signals – like the Global Privacy Platform (GPP) string or the Transparency & Consent Framework (TCF) string – are accurately transmitted across the digital supply chain.
- Providing Oversight of Communication Completeness: Provisioning insights into how well user preferences are communicated from their source to the final ad delivery point. This will surface any propagation failures to ensure that everyone involved in the ad transaction process is on the same page.
In simpler terms, the platform will enhance the correctness, completeness, and pervasiveness of user preference signals.
Core Components of the Accountability Platform
- Roles and Responsibilities: The architecture of the platform is designed around two principal roles: ecosystem participants and a common operator. Ecosystem participants include entities in the AdTech value chain that send or receive user data and preference signals, playing the role of either a Sender or a Receiver. The Common Operator coordinates data gathering, processing, and provisioning results to all participants.
- Structured Process and Standard Data Structures: The platform follows a six-phase cycle that includes logging, data collection, preparation, submission, processing, and provisioning. Each phase has clearly defined responsibilities for both ecosystem participants and the Common Operator. Common logging practices, pairwise sender/receiver transaction information, standard data structures, and randomization of data submission prevent bad actors from gaming the system to avoid scrutiny, and a standard interface to submit and retrieve records for analysis.
- Privacy Protections: Recognizing the importance of user privacy, the Accountability Platform includes features like data transformation and aggregation to guard against potentially revealing data being submitted.
Join Us in the Next Step
With the specification now finalized, we invite members of the digital media ecosystem to participate in the rollout of the Accountability Platform. Your involvement will be instrumental in shaping this initiative and enhancing accountability across the industry.
We are currently seeking participants for a pilot program to test and refine the platform’s capabilities. If you are interested in joining this effort please reach out. For more information or to express your interest in participating, please contact us at support@iabtechlab.com.
Rowena Lam
Sr Director, Privacy & Data
IAB Tech Lab