It’s Not About Data Leakage

"Data leakage" sounds nasty.

The term has been used to describe what happens when 3rd parties drop pixels on publishers’ websites and gain valuable knowledge about the publisher’s audience – often without the publisher knowing. However, “leakage” is also probably not the best way to describe this phenomenon. Leakage insinuates that data is just somehow slipping away from the publisher. That isn’t what is happening.

A more accurate depiction is that 3rd party companies are plucking bits of the publisher’s data while the publisher’s back is turned. Every publisher has a garden of data that they have cultivated, but many don’t know how to harvest it or even know the value of all of the different data types in their garden. A few very smart companies realized the value of the publisher’s data garden and started inviting themselves over to pluck some data here and there to add to the media they’re selling independently of the publisher.

Well, that method turned out to be quite profitable for those demand-side experts and the practice increased and similar companies proliferated. Now many publishers are turning around and seeing that their garden has a lot of footprints from other companies in it, and they’re not happy about it.

The natural reaction for many publishers is to build a fence around that garden to stop everyone else from touching it. But before publishers jump to conclusions, I’d suggest learning more about the pros and cons of having 3rd parties leverage your data because the issue shouldn’t be centered around stopping “leakage,” it should be about publishers gaining greater insight and greater control.

In order for publishers to understand what is happening with their data and gain greater control of it, they need 3 things:

1. Transparency Into All 3rd Parties Collecting Data

Those companies that became experts in selling audience based impressions faster than the publishers have actually helped to increase the value of the publisher’s non-guaranteed inventory in ways the publishers have been unable to do themselves. Advertisers wanted to buy audience based impressions and publishers couldn’t meet that demand, so these demand-side experts found an opportunity to satisfy advertiser needs.

A need for those demand-side experts will continue to exist, but the publisher absolutely needs the ability to see what data is being collected from them, and by what companies. Or going back to the garden analogy, those 3rd party companies should come through the front door rather than sneaking into the garden when the publisher’s back is turned.

2. The Ability to Evaluate The Value Trade-off From 3rd Parties Collecting Data

Once publishers see who is...