The ABC has today been named as the third-party auditor for the IAB UK’s Gold Standard initiative, a project that seeks to boost trust and transparency in online advertising.
In January the IAB UK announced a new iteration of the Gold Standard certificate would launch this year, incorporating steps to address privacy concerns, opening up to third-party auditing and potentially delivering spot-check follow-ups.
At its town hall event today (3 March), IAB UK named ABC as the auditor of choice, along with other upcoming developments such as the inclusion of IAB Europe’s Transparency & Consent Framework version 2 (TCF v2.0). The full launch is expected later in 2020.
“By appointing ABC – an independent third-party auditor – to audit the Gold Standard certification process, we are not only providing assurance of its thoroughness, we are also able to ensure that we put in place internal measures to maintain this level of rigour as the Gold Standard grows and evolves,” said Tim Elkington, IAB UK’s chief digital officer.
The purpose of further developing the Standard is to bring “added rigour” to the certification process, as well as to incorporate steps to address privacy concerns within the digital supply chain.
Industry-owned auditor ABC has played a role in developing and auditing online standards for nearly 25 years and is the auditor for more than 85% of companies choosing to adhere to the JICWEBS DTSG Brand Safety Principles, which is already an integral part of the IAB UK Gold Standard.
ABC conducted the world’s first Brand Safety audit back in 2006, and in the same year partnered with the IAB US to create the International IAB/ABC Spiders and Robots List. It helped launch the Joint Industry Currency for Web Standards (JICWEBS) in 1999.
In 2013, ABC’s viewability testing was the first in the world to be performed in a controlled, walled garden environment.
