‘AdChoices’ Makes it Easier to Tell Your Brand’s Privacy Story – Through the Power of One Icon

Legal mandates are no substitute for the trust-building marketers know how to do with consumers. By leveraging AdChoices, brands and publishers can complement those mandates with proven consumer privacy engagement through the AdChoices program. Relying solely on legal regimes may leave your customer wanting more to achieve greater consumer trust. As we approach 2024, the power of the “AdChoices” icon – and DAA Principles adherence – enables a richer story, setting a path toward trustworthy brand engagement.

The challenge that marketers face has never been greater, as rising consumer expectations, emerging technologies, and a fast-changing regulatory landscape have made it difficult for brands and publishers to set correctly and explain clearly their practices to customers and partners. The DAA’s AdChoices program is designed to make the privacy process simple by providing brands and publishers with clear standards, intuitive and universally recognized tools, respected independent enforcement, and forward-looking technological integrations to meet their needs. Not to mention the ubiquity of the AdChoices icon which consumers see all around the Web and apps.

To make sure your company, and its brands, are telling the right privacy story, ask yourself these questions:

1. Have you (re)certified your adherence to DAA Principles using the ‘AdChoices’ icon?

Companies certify their practices with the DAA and have access to the AdChoices icon [] for use on brand and publisher properties to provide users with information and choices about their online advertising experience, including interest-based advertising. You can learn more at https://digitaladvertisingalliance.org/license, and you can find the icon’s implementation requirements at https://digitaladvertisingalliance.org/resources.

2. Are your properties using a Consent Management Platform to provide customers to manage user information and choices?

If your brand or publisher properties are using a Consent Management Platform (CMP) to collect and manage personal information and user choices, your CMP may not currently provide the cross-site control for such choices that users need and expect. Ask your CMP provider if it has integrated the DAA’s AdChoices icon into its user flow, so your users can access both CMP-specific controls and the industry-wide choices offered through the DAA portals. If your provider has not done so, they can get more information about the DAA’s CMP Complement, including technical specs and implementation information, by contacting info@aboutads.info.

3. Are you using new identifiers to collect and use information for interest-based advertising?

DAA’s newest choice tool – YourAdChoices Token Opt-Out/Revocation Tool – is there to support consumer control when and where token identifiers such as hashed email and hashed phone numbers are used in order to service interest-based advertising. As third-party cookies are deprecated, the reliance on such identifiers are certainly increasing. If your brand or publisher properties deploy such identifiers for IBA, make sure the dedicated section of your Privacy Policy where you talk about your use of identifiers cites a link to the YourAdChoices tool. Additionally, DAA now offers a certification process for both AMI providers and AMI users like brands and publishers to ensure compliance with the industry’s Policy Framework for Addressable Media Identifiers. Please visit https://digitaladvertisingalliance.org/ami for more information.

4. Do your properties carry federal or state political advertising?

If your properties carry political advertising, you can help brands be safe by making sure the purpose and buyer of every political ad is transparent to your users. One of the easiest way to achieve that transparency is through the free DAA Political Ads icon [], which provides consumers with clear, meaningful, and prominent notice that an ad is an express political advertisement advocating for the election or defeat of a candidate for federal or certain statewide elected offices. Encourage your ad network partners to participate in the Political Ads platform or learn how to include the icon on your properties at https://aboutpoliticalads.org/license.

5. Do you or your partners use clean rooms to match consumer data for interest-based advertising?

Clean rooms are subject to DAA obligations around notice and choice if they are processing data for interest-based advertising across sites, apps, or devices. Learn more at https://digitaladvertisingalliance.org/principles.

6. If you offer contextual advertising on any of your properties, do you allow interest-based data to be appended to or utilized from such advertising?

Contextual advertising that utilizes or appends interest-based data must offer consumers notice and choice around the use of that data for interest-based advertising.

7. Do you provide or integrate your properties with a retail media network?

If you offer or utilize a retail media network, then that network should offer notice and choice to its customers if it uses data across sites, apps, or devices for the purposes of interest-based advertising. If you use a white-label provider for such services, make sure they are integrating the DAA’s choice tools into their networks.

8. Do you offer your customers access to the most recent information and resources about interest-based advertising and its reliance on identifiers?

 The DAA has developed a companion website to YourAdChoices to educate consumers about the use of identifiers for interest-based advertising, which can be integrated into your own related content areas, at https://www.aboutidentifiers.org/.

9.  Do you offer your customers access to the DAA’s dashboard for consumer control regarding data collection for interest-based advertising?

Consider updating any links you may currently have in your notices to DAA’s WebChoices tool and replace it with a new link to the DAA’s consumer portal for all of its choice tools across multiple identifier technologies -- including YourAdChoices, AppChoices and WebChoices -- at https://youradchoices.com/control

10. Do you want additional information about working with DAA?

DAA has built the digital advertising industry’s leading self-regulatory program, helping brands, publishers, and other companies across the digital advertising supply chain build trust with their customers and partners. Foundational to the DAA's efforts are the DAA Self-Regulatory Principles, including regular updates to address changing technologies and business models, which are enforced for all companies in digital advertising by independent third parties. The DAA’s ubiquitous AdChoices icon has become the world’s most recognized symbol for digital privacy choices, while the PoliticalAds and Privacy Rights icons have extended DAA leadership into other areas of ad transparency.

The breadth and depth of DAA Principles and supporting programs serve to complement legal regulation – and enable a more comprehensive path to data stewardship vital to consumer trust in brands and advertising.  For more information on how DAA can help your brand, contact info@aboutads.info.

And download our latest perspective: “AdChoices Makes It Easy to Tell Your YourAdChoices.com Brand’s Privacy Story with One Icon.”