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Polluter Program FAQ


The below questions and answers are not legal advice to you – you need your own lawyer for that – but they are some things for you to think about. We hope they will help you understand why we are running this AppEsteem Polluter program – and you will make the choice to improve consumer web browsing experiences.

1. Why is my ad network or website listed on your Polluter Program page?

We found that your ad network or website, in our opinion, violated at least one of our Polluting Indicators. These Indicators have been developed by us, as part of a cross-industry effort between many of the world’s leading security companies, and represent a minimum bar that all ad networks and websites must meet to avoid being called out for what we believe are poor consumer web browsing experiences. If your ad network or website has been designated as polluting, we urge you to stop violating our Polluting Indicators as soon as possible.

2. What process did AppEsteem use to classify my ad network or website as polluting?

Your ad network or website could have reached us through different channels. We hunt for polluting candidates based on consumer sentiment, consumer browsing activity, website popularity, and advertising spend. Polluting candidates are also provided by security companies and submitted by our customers and the public. Once your ad network or website was designated as a polluting candidate, our research team investigated it, and if its behavior violated any of our Polluting Indicators, we classified it as polluting. Then we either tried to notify you, or we posted your ad network or website's information and its violations on our website and shared it with security companies and our Better World Network partners.

3. Why did AppEsteem start its Polluter program?

Our vision is a world where consumers can have great experiences when they browse the web. We believe our Polluter program helps achieve this vision by making it harder for ad networks and websites to display confusing, misleading, and annoying ads. Our Polluter program consists of services featuring the testing, analysis and evaluation of the goods and services of others to determine conformity with certification standards; and the software for identifying, blurring, and blocking advertisements, deceptive web sites, and search results leading to deceptive web sites.

4. What will security companies and Better World Network partners do now that you designated it as polluting?

We recommend that security companies and our Better World Network partners investigate any ad networks and websites we label Polluters, and if they agree with our classification, we encourage them to stop showing their ads when consumers browse the web.

5. Is AppEsteem blocking polluting ad networks and websites?

AppEsteem's Blur.live and Browse.live Ad Control browser extensions hide or block polluting ads. Our publicly-shown Polluter Program page is another way we attempt to help consumers have better web browsing experiences.

6. What do I do if my ad network or website has been designated as polluting?

We have provided information on our website to help guide your cleanup efforts, and we suggest that you read our Polluting Indicators carefully. You can email us at dispute@appesteem.comif you have questions, as we're happy to help you understand our concerns.

Once you've fixed your ad network or website, you may send an email to dispute@appesteem.com, and we will evaluate your fixed ad network or website. We may ask you for additional information so we can better understand, and we will evaluate as soon as possible. If your fixes fail to meet the Indicators, we encourage you to make additional improvements, and to resubmit again for review. If you fail your first submission, it may take up to 30 days to review future times. Once we determine that your ad network or website complies with each of the Polluting Indicators, we will notify the security companies and update our website to note that the new version no longer violates any of our Polluting Indicators.

We hope that some of the companies behind former polluting ad networks and websites are interested in going beyond "not polluting," and either with our help, with the help of a compliance partner, or on their own, have released new versions that not only not violate our Polluting Indicators, but also meet all of our freely-available Certification Requirements – thus evolving from being labeled as polluting, to becoming an adopter of industry-best practices.

7. Once my ad network or website is no longer pollluting, will security companies and Better World Network partners automatically unblock me?

Once your ad network or website is marked as “Resolved” on our website, we will inform security companies and our Better World Network partners, however, we do not control the evaluation or final determination made.

Some security companies and Better World Network partners may only re-evaluate previous polluting ad networks and websites once the ad network or website meets our full list of Certification Requirements. We encourage you to modify your ad network or website to meet our freely available list of Certification Requirements, or even apply for our Certification Program.

8. What do I do if I believe my ad network or website was designated as polluting in error?

If you believe that we have misclassified your ad network or website as polluting, please send an email to dispute@appesteem.com. We may ask you for additional information so we can better understand your ad network or website and how to reach you. We will re-evaluate and determine if the designation should be removed.

9. Can I appeal your re-evaluation decision?

You are welcome to contact us at dispute@appesteem.com to appeal a polluting designation, and we will re-evaluate an unlimited number of revisions to ensure it is moved out of the active polluting ad networks and websites list once it has been remediated. We suggest you modify your ad network or website to meet all of the Polluting Indicators, and email us for help if anything is unclear.

10. Can I just pay you money to prevent my ad network or website from being labeled as polluting?

No. This Polluter program is FREE – in that no one, no matter their relationship with us, can pay to remove their polluting designation. We also offer both our Certification Requirements and Polluting Indicators to the public under the Creative Commons Open Source License, to ensure money is never a factor in driving compliance with these requirements.

We fund our business by running separate, paid certification services for companies that want to engage our help in understanding our requirements, and resolving issues that may arise with security companies and our Better World Network partners. All of our current customer contracts and fee schedules are publicly available on our website.

11. Isn’t labeling my ad network or website as polluting defamation, or disparagement of my brand, or interfering with my potential or actual contract with the end users?

No. The AppEsteem polluting designation represents our opinion that the ad network or website failed to meet one or more of our Polluting Indicators, which we believe are key identifiers of poor consumer web browsing experiences. Our goal with the Polluter program is to keep consumers away from ads on ad networks and websites that we believe are ruining the consumer web browsing experience. We do not have any agreements that require any security company or Better World Network partner to automatically block polluting ad networks or websites. All of our current agreements with other companies about the Polluter program are publicly available on our website – such as our Terms of Use.

12. Should I sue AppEsteem because they claimed my ad network or website was polluting?

We anticipate that you may be insulted or even angry that we designated your ad network or website as polluting. We want you to understand that AppEsteem is dedicated to help protect consumers from harassing and objectionable material, and to help to enable both ourselves, security companies, and our Better World Network partners to restrict access to such material. We strongly believe that it would be significantly easier (and cheaper) for you to clean up the behavior of your ad network or website, than it would be to convince us, or a Court, that our determination that you failed one or more of our Polluting Indicators is not protected and not in the best interests of consumers. We are committed to transparency and fairness. Therefore, we plan to disclose our receipt of any Cease and Desist letters (or equivalent demands) on our website, along with the polluting designation related to that letter.

13. How does AppEsteem benefit from running this Polluter program?

Our Polluter program primarily helps improve consumer web browsing experiences by driving cleaner behavior. It also helps us offer more value for our Certification program, because we're helping certified ad networks and websites compete on a level playing field. The companies behind these ad networks and websites have made the business decision to be clean; why should a competitor using polluting techniques have the opportunity to ruin a consumer's web browsing experience? Another way we benefit: as we hunt for polluting ad networks and websites, we hope to find non-polluting ad networks and websites that could be good leads for our sales team. So, while looking for polluting ad networks and websites primarily helps improve consumer web browsing experiences, we believe that it can also provide value to our customers and help grow our business. Finally, we may choose to offer consumers paid services to help them block polluting ads.

14. Did you claim my ad network or website was polluting because I didn't do business with AppEsteem?

No, we're not interested in doing anything that remotely resembles a shake-down – and we note again that our Polluting remediation program is FREE! Thus, while we will continue to build our certification program, and aim to get more customers for it and for our consumer-based products, the independent determination by you to not become a customer will not influence in any way whether we evaluate your ad network or website as polluting.

15. Does AppEsteem immediately publicize every ad network or website they label as polluting?

We recognize several scenarios where we believe we can increase the likelihood of getting you to clean up polluting behavior and improve consumer web browsing experiences by notifying you before we publicly designate the ad network or website as a Polluter. In the following situations, we will generally provide an advanced notice to you, and at the end of this period, we will include the ad network or website as either a current or a remediated polluting ad network or website on our website. The scenarios are:

  • If your ad network or website is currently and actively in the process of getting certified.
  • If you have established a good track record with us for quickly fixing your Polluting Indicator violations.
  • If you are a security vendor who is in the business of protecting consumers.
  • If you are a vendor who is in the business of improving consumer web browsing experiences by blocking polluting ad networks or websites.
  • When, in our sole discretion, we feel that calling out your ad network or website would be against the consumers' best interests.

However, despite the foregoing scenarios, if we determine that you have previously been notified of the current or other violation of any Polluting Indicator, or if we believe the ad network or website has behavior that may cause substantial harm to consumers, we may publicly designate the ad network or website as polluting immediately. In addition, if the suspected polluting ad network or website is brought to our attention by a security company, one of our Better World Network pasrtners, or other third party, independent of the above situations, we may publicly designate the ad network or website as polluting immediately. In all cases, the driver of timing behind our public disclosure is improving consumer web browsing experiences – our hope is that public disclosure, or the potential of public disclosure, will urge vendors to fix polluting behavior before more consumers suffer.