Cookie Policy.

1. What Are Cookies and Tracking Technologies?

Cookies are small text files that are stored on your browser or device by websites, apps, online media, and advertisements. Auctera uses cookies and similar technologies-such as web beacons (pixels), local storage, mobile advertising IDs (MAIDs), and statistical identifiers-to remember your preferences, understand how you interact with our platforms, and deliver highly relevant programmatic advertising.

Because Auctera operates both a B2B corporate website and a massive programmatic advertising infrastructure (the D-REVX Data Layer), we classify our use of these technologies into two distinct operational scopes, which are detailed below.

2. Corporate Website Cookies

When you visit auctera.io, we deploy first-party cookies to ensure the website functions correctly and to analyze B2B visitor traffic.

Categories of Corporate Cookies:

• Strictly Necessary Cookies: These are essential for the site to operate. They include session cookies for the D-REVX login portal, load balancing cookies, and cookies that store your consent preferences (so we don't ask you repeatedly). These cannot be disabled in our systems.
• Performance & Analytics Cookies: We use tools like Google Analytics to measure site traffic, identify which marketing pages are most popular, and understand error rates. This helps us improve the user experience. You can opt-out of these via our Cookie Consent Manager.
• Marketing & CRM Cookies: We use B2B marketing tools (like HubSpot or Marketo) to identify companies visiting our site and to track interactions with our sales outreach emails.

3. DSP & Programmatic Advertising Cookies

The Auctera Demand Side Platform (DSP) buys ad inventory across thousands of websites and apps in milliseconds. To do this efficiently and to prevent users from seeing the same ad too many times, the DSP relies on third-party cookies and identifiers dropped on publisher websites.

How the DSP Uses Cookies:

• Frequency Capping: A core feature of the D-REVX Data Layer is preventing ad fatigue. When an Auctera ad is served, a cookie records that impression. If the DSP wins another auction for the same browser, it checks the cookie to ensure the daily impression limit has not been exceeded.
• Retargeting (Cross-Device Cloud): If you visit an advertiser's website (e.g., viewing a pair of shoes), the advertiser fires an Auctera pixel. Our DSP drops a cookie categorizing your browser as interested in that product. We may subsequently bid on ad inventory across the web to show you an ad for those shoes.
• Attribution: If you click an ad served by the Auctera DSP and later purchase the product, a cookie helps us attribute that final sale back to the specific ad impression you viewed days earlier.

4. Affiliate Tracking Pixels

The Auctera Affiliate Network relies on precise tracking to ensure Publishers are fairly compensated for the sales they generate. When an end-user clicks a Publisher's affiliate link, they pass through Auctera's tracking servers before reaching the Advertiser.

During this redirect, a first-party or third-party cookie (depending on the Advertiser's setup) is placed on the user's browser containing a unique "Click ID" and a timestamp. The typical lifespan of an affiliate cookie is 30, 60, or 90 days. If the user completes a purchase within that window, the Advertiser's confirmation page fires an Auctera tracking pixel, which reads the cookie, retrieves the Click ID, and credits the Publisher with the commission.

5. DSP Cookie Syncing

In the programmatic ecosystem, different Supply Side Platforms (SSPs) and Ad Exchanges use their own proprietary cookie IDs. To recognize a user across different exchanges, Auctera participates in "Cookie Syncing" (also known as Cookie Matching).

Cookie syncing is a background process where Auctera and an exchange (e.g., Google AdX, Magnite, PubMatic) briefly exchange pseudonymous IDs. For example, Auctera's ID `123` is mapped to the Exchange's ID `ABC` in our D-REVX Data Layer. This allows our bidding algorithms to apply frequency caps and retargeting segments regardless of which exchange is running the auction. These synced tables do not contain directly identifying information.

6. Fraud Prevention Technologies

To protect Advertisers from invalid traffic and botnets, Auctera utilizes specific cookies and local storage tokens as part of our Pre-Bid IVT Shield.

These specialized tracking technologies measure browser characteristics, mouse movements, device orientation, and execution times to establish a "human telemetry profile." If the profile indicates automated or malicious activity, the identifier is flagged, and the DSP will refuse to bid on any subsequent inventory associated with that identifier. These cookies are considered Strictly Necessary for security purposes.

7. Third-Party Cookies

Because the Auctera DSP serves ads across the open internet, our tracking technologies are often classified as "third-party cookies" by your browser, because the domain dropping the cookie (e.g., `track.auctera.io`) differs from the domain you are visiting (e.g., `newswebsite.com`).

We mandate that all Publishers utilizing our network implement valid Consent Management Platforms (CMPs) to obtain end-user consent before allowing our third-party cookies to execute, in compliance with the IAB Transparency and Consent Framework (TCF v2.2).

8. Managing Your Consent

For the corporate website (auctera.io), you can easily manage your cookie preferences at any time by clicking the "Customize" option in our Cookie Consent Banner, or by clearing your browser cookies, which will prompt the banner to reappear.

You can also control cookies directly through your browser settings. Most modern browsers (Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Edge) allow you to block all third-party cookies, clear existing cookies on exit, or utilize "Incognito" modes that destroy tracking data upon closing the window. Note that blocking third-party cookies may prevent you from participating in affiliate cashback programs or receiving personalized advertising.

9. Industry Opt-Out Tools

If you wish to opt-out of programmatic targeted advertising served by the Auctera DSP (and other ad-tech platforms), you can utilize centralized industry tools. Opting out will place an "Opt-Out Cookie" on your browser, signaling to our DSP to stop targeting you with personalized ads and to halt data collection for retargeting purposes.

• USA: Digital Advertising Alliance (DAA) WebChoices
• USA: Network Advertising Initiative (NAI) Opt-Out
• Europe: European Interactive Digital Advertising Alliance (EDAA) Your Online Choices
• Mobile: You can reset or limit ad tracking using your device settings (e.g., "Limit Ad Tracking" on older iOS, App Tracking Transparency on modern iOS, or "Opt out of Ads Personalization" on Android).

10. Server-Side Tracking (The Cookieless Future)

As browsers increasingly deprecate third-party cookies, Auctera is transitioning to advanced cookieless measurement via Server-to-Server (S2S) APIs. In these architectures, rather than dropping a cookie on the user's browser, the Advertiser's server securely communicates conversion data directly to Auctera's servers using hashed identifiers (like hashed emails or first-party transaction IDs). This provides robust attribution accuracy while significantly enhancing end-user privacy and device security.

11. Contact Us

If you have any questions or require technical clarification regarding our use of cookies, tracking pixels, or the D-REVX architecture, please reach out to our privacy and engineering teams.

Email: privacy@auctera.io
Mail: Auctera LLC, Attn: Privacy Engineering, New York, NY, United States