Cybersecurity leader HUMAN, best known for collectively protecting enterprises from bot attacks, today announced the formation of The Human Collective, a new program designed to protect the digital advertising ecosystem from the impacts of fraud. The Human Collective brings together publishers, demand-side partners (DSPs), supply-side partners (SSPs), agencies, and brands in a commitment to disincentivise cybercrime by raising the consequences and practical cost of fraud through shared resources and cooperation. Flagship members include Omnicom Media Group, The Trade Desk, Magnite, and Amica Mutual Insurance.

Members of The Human Collective will use HUMAN’s privacy-sensitive Human Verification Engine to gain greater visibility into the behaviour and tactics of cybercriminals.  Together, members will exert an outsized impact on fraud, ensuring a safer ecosystem for digital advertisers, the agency community, their technology partners, and the publishers whose content powers the environment.

“This initiative is the next logical step for HUMAN in fundamentally disrupting the economics of cybercrime,” said Tamer Hassan, CEO of HUMAN. “The Human Collective will bring together critical players in the digital advertising ecosystem in a way they’ve never collaborated before, with the end result being a collectively protected advertising supply chain with demonstrably reduced levels of fraud.”

Each flagship member of The Human Collective will fulfil several key commitments, including company-wide education about cybercrime and the role the company plays in curtailing it, deployment of HUMAN’s technology for gathering insight to protect against cybercriminal behaviour and tactics, and building a framework to transact through protected partners.

“Participating in this initiative is just one further step we’re taking at Amica to maximise our digital media investments and hold everyone in the ecosystem more accountable for business outcomes,” said James Bussiere, senior vice president of Marketing at Amica. “Our role as advertisers is critical to this mission, as it’s advertisers’ budgets that fraudsters are taking advantage of. Working with industry partners in The Human Collective will afford protection to advertisers and customers across the internet.”

“The acceleration of CTV has presented new opportunities for exploitation” says Scott Hagedorn, CEO of Omnicom Media Group North America. “The Human Collective provides a framework to ensure we are doing everything we can to limit the funding of cybercrime.  We do that through expanded and enhanced education of our team and of our clients, along with updated buying requirements that continue to set firm expectations with our supply chain.”

“We have always worked to optimise the supply side of ad inventory on behalf of our clients,” said JoAnna Foyle, senior vice president, inventory partnerships at The Trade Desk. “Collaboration with industry leaders has been key to our success, and we welcome the opportunity to further expand those efforts through our participation in The Human Collective.”

“Magnite believes that minimising fraud requires the industry’s commitment to deploying all of the tools at our disposal, including not only technological solutions, but aligning economic incentives through the entire supply chain and considering even the protocols we use to trade,” said John Clyman, VP engineering, marketplace quality & security at Magnite. “This initiative parallels our internal approaches that protect buyers and sellers, and we look forward to cooperating further with like-minded organisations.”

In the coming months, HUMAN will announce the Founding Members of The Human Collective, a group of organisations hand-picked to enhance and embolden the foundation provided by the Flagship class. Together, the members will further strengthen the protection around the numerous access points for bot attacks and fraud in the supply chain. More information about The Human Collective is available at www.humansecurity.com/humancollective.