Invalid Traffic (IVT)

When advertising impressions are generated by machines, data centres, bots, or any other form of non-human activity, this is categorised as invalid traffic (IVT). The Media Rating Council (MRC) divides IVT into two formats – general invalid traffic (GIVT) and sophisticated invalid traffic (SIVT) (see separate definitions).

Not all IVT is fraudulent or malicious, but any form of non-human impressions will have an impact on campaign performance and metrics, so various filtration and blocking methods are used to reduce it.