Brand Safety Categories Explained: Safety, Suitability and URL Data
Brand safety categories decide where an advertiser's money must never go, and where it may go with care. This guide explains the categories, what happened to the industry framework behind them, and how domain categories turn those rules into lists you can use.
Safety floor
Content almost no brand wants to fund, such as illegal, explicit or malicious material. It is excluded for everyone.
Suitability
Sensitive but legitimate topics, such as news about conflict or sites about alcohol. Each brand sets its own tolerance.
URL categories
Labels on each domain that let you apply the floor and your suitability rules before a single impression is bought.
Brand safety vs brand suitability
The two terms are often used as if they mean the same thing. They do not, and mixing them up is the most common reason campaigns either run next to harmful content or lose half their reach to over-blocking.
Brand safety
A shared minimum standard. The question is simple: should any advertising appear here at all?
- Applies to every advertiser in the same way
- Covers illegal, explicit, hateful and malicious content
- Usually enforced as a hard exclusion at domain level
- Rarely changes from campaign to campaign
Brand suitability
A brand-specific choice. The question is: does this context fit this brand, this product and this message?
- Differs between a beer brand, a bank and a toy maker
- Covers sensitive topics such as news, politics, alcohol, dating
- Expressed as risk tolerance: low, medium or high
- Changes by campaign, market and season
Rule of thumb: the floor is the same list for everyone, while suitability is a set of switches. Domain categories are the input for both, which is why the quality of that category data matters so much.
The GARM framework: a short history
Most brand safety category lists in use today trace back to one industry effort. Knowing its history helps you read partner settings and contracts that still refer to it.
An industry alliance forms
The World Federation of Advertisers launched the Global Alliance for Responsible Media (GARM), bringing advertisers, agencies and platforms together to agree common language for harmful content.
Shared definitions are published
GARM released its Brand Safety Floor and Suitability Framework. It defined a set of sensitive topic areas, a floor for each, and three suitability risk levels above the floor.
The framework is updated
A revised version added misinformation as a topic area, bringing the list to twelve. Platforms and verification tools aligned their settings with these shared terms.
GARM is discontinued
The WFA announced that GARM would cease operating, after an antitrust lawsuit named the WFA, GARM and several member advertisers. The WFA itself continues to operate.
The vocabulary outlives the alliance
The floor and tier language is still widely referenced in platform controls, agency policies and IAB taxonomy material. There is no longer one joint body updating it, so each partner may define the details differently.
What this means for you: when a partner says "GARM-aligned", ask which version of the definitions they apply and how they map them to their own categories. Write your own policy in plain terms so it does not depend on a framework that is no longer maintained.
The sensitive topic areas behind brand safety categories
The framework grouped harmful and sensitive content into topic areas. The summaries below are written in our own words to show what each area typically covers in practice.
Adult and explicit content
Sexual content, explicit imagery and adult services. Almost always a floor exclusion.
Arms and ammunition
Weapons sales, modifications and promotion. Some sporting and hunting brands accept parts of it.
Crime and harmful acts
Content that promotes or depicts crimes against people, including human rights abuses.
Death, injury, conflict
War, disasters and graphic injury. News coverage of these topics sits mostly in suitability, not the floor.
Online piracy
Unauthorized copies of films, music, software and games, and the sites that distribute them.
Hate and aggression
Content attacking people for protected characteristics, and calls to harass or harm them.
Obscenity and profanity
Heavy profanity and crude material. Comedy and music sites often land in the suitability tiers.
Drugs, alcohol, tobacco
Illegal drugs at the floor; legal alcohol, tobacco and vaping as suitability choices for adult brands.
Spam and harmful software
Malware, phishing, deceptive downloads and sites built only to trick users.
Terrorism
Content that promotes or glorifies terrorist groups and acts. Always below the floor.
Debated social issues
Political and social debates. Legitimate content, so it belongs to suitability rules rather than the floor.
Misinformation
False or misleading claims that can cause harm. Added in 2022 and the hardest area to judge at domain level.
Risk levels: the floor plus three suitability tiers
Each topic area was split into a floor and three suitability levels. Advertisers pick the highest level they accept per topic, which gives a simple grid for writing a policy.
Floor
Never appropriate for ads. Excluded for every campaign, regardless of brand or market.
High risk
Graphic or very sensitive treatment of a topic. Only brands with a clear reason accept it.
Medium risk
Sensitive topics handled in a factual or dramatic way. Many brands accept this with care.
Low risk
Educational, informative or light treatment. Suitable for most brands most of the time.
Domain categories are most reliable for the floor and for clear subject areas. The finer difference between medium and low risk often depends on the individual page, which is why many buyers combine domain data with page checks on their largest sites.
How URL categories map to brand safety topics
Our database labels every domain with web filtering categories and IAB content categories. The table shows how the web filtering labels line up with the topic areas above, and how most advertisers treat them.
| Topic area | Web filtering categories in our data | Typical treatment | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Adult and explicit | Adult | Floor | Exclude at domain level. Lingerie/Swimsuits/Intimate Apparel is separate and usually a suitability choice. |
| Arms and ammunition | Weapons | Suitability or Floor | Retail weapons sites vary by market and law. Many brands exclude the whole category. |
| Drugs | Illegal Drugs | Floor | Harm reduction and health information may appear under Health & Medicine instead. |
| Alcohol and tobacco | Alcohol; Tobacco | Suitability | Fine for some adult brands, excluded for family and youth brands. |
| Hate and aggression | Hate/Discrimination | Floor | A small category with high stakes. Keep it on the exclusion list everywhere. |
| Death, injury, violence | Violence; Military | Suitability | Graphic violence sites at the floor; military history and defense news in suitability. |
| Online piracy | File Sharing/P2P | Floor | Often paired with Freeware/Software reviews for risky download sites. |
| Spam and harmful software | Malware / Phishing / Suspicious; Parked / For-Sale Domains | Floor | Parked pages are not harmful as such, but they offer no real audience for ads. |
| Debated social issues | Political; News/Media | Suitability | Keep quality news. Apply topic rules instead of blocking the whole category. |
| Gambling and dating | Gambling; Dating | Suitability | Regulated in many markets. Some brands need them excluded by law or policy. |
| Everything else | Business, Shopping, Travel, Sports & Recreation and 40+ more | Open | Use IAB categories here for contextual targeting rather than for safety. |
How many domains sit in the sensitive categories
Counts below are domains in our full database that carry the label. A domain can carry more than one label, so the numbers overlap.
For the subject side, our IAB categories list explains the top-level content categories, and the dual taxonomy guide shows how IAB and web filtering labels sit side by side on each domain.
Domain-level, page-level and app-level checks
Brand safety can be applied at different levels of detail. Each has a place, and most mature setups use more than one.
Fast, cheap, pre-bid
One lookup per site, done before the auction. Ideal for the floor and for whole categories you never buy. Works offline from a licensed file.
Weak spot: very broad sites, such as large news portals or forums, where one domain covers many subjects.
Precise, heavier
Looks at the individual article or page. Needed to tell a crime report apart from a sports story on the same news domain.
Weak spot: cost and latency at scale, and new pages that have not been analysed yet.
Different signals
Mobile apps, connected TV and audio use bundle IDs and channel names rather than URLs. Many apps still have a web domain you can classify.
Weak spot: inventory that hides its true source, which is a fraud problem as much as a safety one.
A practical pattern: use domain categories to remove the floor and set broad suitability rules, then spend page-level checks only on the few hundred domains that carry most of your spend.
Building a brand suitability profile from category data
A written profile keeps planners, traders and partners on the same page. These steps turn a policy into domain lists you can load into a DSP, an ad server or a verification setup.
- Write the floor in plain wordsList the topic areas you never fund. Keep it short and identical across brands in your group.
- Choose a tolerance per topicFor each sensitive area, pick low, medium or high. A spirits brand and a children's brand will differ on alcohol, not on hate.
- Map topics to categoriesTranslate each line into web filtering and IAB categories, using a table like the one above.
- Pull the domain listsFilter the database by those categories. Add popularity bands so you can see how much reach each rule removes.
- Review the edge casesLook at the most popular domains in each excluded group. If a well-known quality publisher is caught, refine the rule.
- Load and refreshUpload exclusion and inclusion lists, then refresh them monthly and add newly registered domains daily.
Popularity bands help a lot in step five. Our top websites ranking shows how popularity groups work, and the brand safety use case covers how teams load the lists.
The news problem: safety without starving journalism
Why keyword and category blocking hurts news
Broad block lists often catch every news domain because news covers crime, war and politics. The result is lost reach on high-quality, high-attention sites.
It also pushes spend toward low-value sites built only for ads, which carry their own risks.
- Keep reputable News/Media domains on an inclusion list by default
- Use page-level checks for the topics you avoid, not domain blocks
- Separate Political from News/Media in your rules
- Review news exclusions every quarter, since they tend to grow quietly
- Pair news inclusion with a made-for-advertising site exclusion to protect quality
If you buy news inventory directly, our list of news websites describes how news domains are grouped by country and topic.
Common mistakes with brand safety categories
Treating suitability as safety
Putting alcohol, dating or politics on the global floor list removes reach for brands that could run there safely.
Lists that never update
Exclusion lists built once miss new domains, expired domains that change owner and sites that change subject.
Ignoring parked domains
Parked and for-sale domains still serve ad slots in some setups. They add impressions but no real audience.
One label per domain
Big platforms cover many topics. A single label hides the sensitive part, so use data where a domain can carry several ranked labels.
No reach check
Every exclusion has a cost. Measure how many popular domains each rule removes before you switch it on.
Different rules per partner
When each platform uses its own interpretation, results differ. A shared domain list keeps the policy consistent.
Who uses brand safety category data, and how
The same domain labels serve very different jobs across the ad supply chain. Here is how each group typically puts them to work.
Advertisers
Write one group-wide floor and a suitability grid per brand, then hand partners the same domain lists so every buy follows one policy.
Agencies
Keep client-specific inclusion and exclusion lists, and report how much reach each rule removes so clients can make informed trade-offs.
DSPs and SSPs
Look up the category of every bid request domain in memory, filter the floor before the auction and pass category signals to buyers. See programmatic and RTB use.
Publishers and networks
Check which categories their own sites and partner sites carry, so buyers do not exclude them by mistake. See publisher monetization.
| Policy line in plain words | Category rule | Reach check |
|---|---|---|
| We never fund explicit or illegal content | Exclude Adult, Illegal Drugs, Hate/Discrimination, Malware / Phishing / Suspicious | Small reach impact, keep always on |
| We avoid alcohol for our youth brands | Exclude Alcohol and Tobacco for listed brands only | Check the top domains removed per market |
| We support quality journalism | Include News/Media, apply page rules for crime and conflict topics | Compare reach with and without news |
| We do not pay for empty inventory | Exclude Parked / For-Sale Domains and made-for-advertising sites | Usually raises quality with little lost audience |
Brand safety categories: frequently asked questions
What is the difference between brand safety and brand suitability?
Brand safety is the floor: content that almost no advertiser wants to fund. Brand suitability is the layer above it, where each brand decides how much risk it accepts on sensitive but legitimate topics.
Does the GARM framework still exist?
GARM was discontinued by the WFA in August 2024. Its definitions are still widely referenced, but no single body maintains them as a joint standard, so check each partner's current interpretation.
How do URL categories help with brand safety?
They let you exclude whole sites below your floor and set suitability rules for sensitive categories before any bid. Page-level checks can be added on top for very broad sites.
Should news sites be on a brand safety block list?
Usually not as a whole. Keep reputable news domains and apply suitability rules to specific topics, so you keep valuable reach.
How often should a brand safety domain list be refreshed?
At least monthly, with newly registered domains added daily if you buy open exchange inventory. Our newly registered domains list explains the daily feed.
Which taxonomy should brand safety categories use?
Many teams use the IAB Content Taxonomy for subject matter and a separate risk set for safety. Our data carries both, and you can check a domain to see the labels side by side.
Turn your suitability policy into domain lists
Web filtering categories, IAB categories, personas and popularity bands for over 120 million domains, delivered as files with a lookup API included. Pick the plan that fits your volume.
See plans and pricing Explore the databaseIAB is a trademark of the Interactive Advertising Bureau. GARM and the World Federation of Advertisers are named only to describe the history of an industry framework. URL Categorization Database is not affiliated with, sponsored or endorsed by either organization.