We can always find something about ad fraud. Here’s a DoubleVerify report that ad fraud on connected TV grew 161% from May 2019 to April 2020, reflecting fast growth of the medium and lagging anti-fraud technology. On the bright side, over-all ad fraud was down 35% and display ad viewability improved 9%. They also report that consumers like contextual ad targeting, a fairly fraud-safe approach that DoubleVerify happens to offer.
Aphersis raises €2.5M for privacy-safe data sharing Aphersis, which ensures secure, private data collaboration and analysis for global pharma, manufacturing and telecom companies, has just received seed funding from top-tier investors, including Twitter’s board chair. The company uses decentralized computing, federated learning and cryptographic protocols to make it possible to share highly sensitive data.
If you’ve been wondering how much mobile device usage grew during the pandemic, App Annie has some answers: mobile hours were up 25% compared with the second half of 2019 and ad placements in June 2020 were 70% higher than June 2019. PubMatic’s quarterly mobile ad report found similar growth and a surge in ads bought through private marketplaces: these are expected to account for 51% of programmatic mobile ad spending, exceeding the volume on open exchanges. Private marketplaces offer less risk of inappropriate placements than open exchanges.
T-Mobile will acquire out-of-home adtech business Vistar Media for $600 million. Vistar Media is managing advertising campaigns across over one million digital screens. Its capabilities will combine with T-Mobile’s customer insights and data and its extensive in-store retail media network.