From “what is an impression?” to SSAI spoofing.
8 tracks, 45 lessons, about 6 hours of reading. Start anywhere: each lesson explains its own jargon, links every term to the glossary, and ends with a quiz.
- Track 1 · beginner · 5 lessons
Ad tech foundations
Start here if words like CPM, SSP or programmatic sound like noise. Five lessons walk you from "why is this website free?" to a clear map of every company that touches an ad, and where the money leaks along the way.
- Track 2 · intermediate · 7 lessons
Programmatic, step by step
Seven lessons that open up the machinery of automated ad buying: bid requests, DSPs and SSPs, header bidding, first-price auctions, deals, supply path optimization and the new curation layer. By the end you can read an OpenRTB request and trace a dollar from brand to publisher.
- Track 3 · intermediate · 5 lessons
Data, identity & privacy
Advertising runs on recognising people across screens and sites. This track explains cookies, the IDs that try to replace them, clean rooms, the return of contextual targeting and the privacy laws that set the rules, in plain English.
- Cookies explained: first-party, third-party and syncing 7 min
- First-party data and the new IDs: UID2, RampID, MAIDs and more 8 min
- Data clean rooms: sharing insight without sharing data 7 min
- The contextual comeback: targeting the page, not the person 7 min
- Consent and privacy law: GDPR, TCF, GPP, CCPA and India's DPDP 9 min
- Track 4 · intermediate · 8 lessons
Invalid traffic & ad fraud
The deepest track on AdTech Sumo. You will learn exactly what the industry counts as invalid traffic, how bots and fraud rings fake humans, apps and TVs, and how the real cases from Methbot to BADBOX 2.0 worked. Then you will learn how fraud is caught and how to protect a budget or an inventory.
- What is invalid traffic? 7 min
- GIVT vs SIVT: the two kinds of invalid traffic 8 min
- How bots fake humans 9 min
- Spoofing: fake websites, apps and devices 9 min
- Mobile app and CTV fraud 10 min
- Made-for-advertising sites and traffic arbitrage 9 min
- How fraud gets caught 10 min
- Protecting your spend (and your inventory) 10 min
- Track 5 · intermediate · 5 lessons
Measurement & verification
Buying an ad is easy; knowing what it achieved is hard. This track explains viewability, brand safety and suitability, attribution, incrementality and marketing mix modelling, and the newer attention metrics, so you can tell a real result from a flattering report.
- Track 6 · intermediate · 6 lessons
Channels: CTV, mobile, retail, audio, DOOH
Ads are no longer just banners on web pages. This track walks through connected TV, mobile apps, retail and commerce media, audio and podcasts, digital out-of-home, and search, social and AI assistants, explaining how each one works, who the big players are and where invalid traffic hides.
- CTV and streaming: how ads reach the big screen 9 min
- Mobile app advertising: SDKs, mediation, MMPs and SKAN 9 min
- Retail and commerce media: ads where people buy 8 min
- Audio and podcasts: ads you hear 7 min
- Digital out-of-home: billboards that bid 7 min
- Search, social and AI: the biggest ad businesses and the newest 9 min
- Track 7 · advanced · 5 lessons
Money, markets & M&A
Every ad dollar gets sliced up on its way from a brand to a website. This track shows who takes each slice, how ad tech companies turn those slices into revenue, how to read their earnings reports, and why the industry keeps merging into fewer, bigger owners.
- Track 8 · advanced · 4 lessons
Standards, policy & antitrust
Ad tech runs on two kinds of rules: voluntary standards written by industry bodies, and laws written by governments. This track explains who writes each, how files like ads.txt and sellers.json fight fraud, what the courts decided about Google’s ad tech business, and how privacy law differs around the world.