IAB Canada has been tracking the Canadian News Bill C-18 and the concerns it has raised with regards to supporting access in the Canadian media marketplace. As a result, we are encouraged by the increasing demand for the Canadian News Media List. Ahead of its time, the project positions Canada as a leader in efforts to give domestic news media a fighting chance in the programmatic landscape.
Originally launched in 2020, the list helps advertisers globally, to access trusted news sites in the Canadian market. By offering a defined and verified Tech Lab object that acts as an “allowlist”, the Canadian News Media List will help advertisers circumvent domestic news blockage in their efforts to shield brand exposure to international, volatile news content – especially in today’s highly political climate. This effort goes a long way towards protecting domestic news content from the broader blockages that impact all English-speaking news entities around the globe.
The IAB Tech Lab-sanctioned list of credible local news publishers not only helps buyers safely place ads on Canadian news publisher websites, but also provides buyers important data points about the supply chain to develop greater confidence among buyers placing ads via programmatic real time bidding methods on the listed sites such as ads.txt.
While the initiative may appear simplistic in nature, it offers the industry several benefits:
- A centralized, IAB sanctioned “object”
- Conveyance of important attributes that will only grow in importance (ads.txt enabled, privacy compliance etc.) in the future
- International promotion and distribution to Ad Tech communities and the Buy-side
- The critical category (news) fully supported here
IAB Tech Lab has published the News Media List on the IAB Tech Lab tools portal. Users can download (free of charge) the most current version of the Contributor list upon entering into a license agreement. Registered users will get access to an API to enable machine readable download of the list.
We encourage our members and the industry at large to explore the Allow List and utilize it to create a specific domestic news product. We would also encourage the entire Canadian Media buy-side to help support domestic news content by enabling the Allow List on media buys.
In the coming weeks, IAB Canada will be releasing access to the broader, domestic digital media database. This tool will provide media buyers with a search engine that will assist in finding on-the-ground local media across Canada with the ability to filter for formats, geography and other attributes.
If you are a Canadian news content provider and wish to be included (at no charge) or have any questions about accessing the list or want to join our Local Media working group, please reach out to policy@iabcanada.com and stay tuned for updates on other exciting progress we are making in support of Canadian media entities.