What is the brand safety floor, and who defines it now?
Part of Brand suitability
The short answer
The brand safety floor is the content that no advertiser should fund, such as material that promotes illegal arms sales, incites hatred or spreads malware. Since GARM ended in August 2024, the floor is set in layers: the law, each platform's monetization policies, shared industry references and the advertiser's own written policy, which the buyer should document.
Key takeaways
- The floor is content judged unfit for any advertising, as opposed to content that only some brands avoid.
- Floor items describe promotion, instruction, incitement and illegal acts, while reporting and education on the same subjects sit in lower risk levels.
- With GARM gone, the floor comes from four layers: law, platform policy, industry references and the advertiser's written decision.
- Platforms separate content they will not monetize from content they only restrict, and a buyer's floor has to account for both.
- A floor document names its source for every category, where it is enforced, who approved it and when it changed.
What content sits below the brand safety floor?
Definition
- Brand safety floor
- The set of content described as “not appropriate for any advertising support” in the Brand Safety Floor and Suitability Framework. Content above the floor may still be avoided by some brands, but that is a suitability choice, not a floor.
The framework, now a legacy reference published by the Brand Safety Institute (opens in a new tab), describes the floor category by category. The pattern is consistent: the floor covers content that promotes, teaches, incites or is itself an illegal act. Depicting the same subject, reporting on it or teaching about it moves the content into the high, medium or low risk columns that brands set for themselves.
| Category | At the floor | First level above it (high risk) |
|---|---|---|
| Arms and ammunition | “Instructive content on how to obtain, make, distribute, or use illegal arms” | “Glamorization or gratuitous depiction of illegal sale or possession of Arms” |
| Death, injury or military conflict | “Promotion, incitement or advocacy of violence, death or injury” | “Depiction of death or Injury” |
| Illegal drugs, tobacco, e-cigarettes, vaping and alcohol | “Promotion and advocacy of Tobacco and e-cigarette (Vaping) & Alcohol use to minors” | “Glamorization or gratuitous depictions of illegal drugs/abuse of prescription drugs” |
| Hate speech and acts of aggression | Content that “incites hatred, promotes violence, vilifies, or dehumanizes groups or individuals” on grounds such as race, religion or gender identity | Depiction of hateful content “in a noneducational, informational, or scientific context” |
| Online piracy | “Pirating, Copyright infringement, & Counterfeiting” | “Glamorization or gratuitous depiction of Online Piracy” |
| Spam or harmful content | “Malware/Phishing” | “Glamorization or gratuitous depiction of Spam or Malware” |
Who defines the brand safety floor now that GARM has ended?
The World Federation of Advertisers discontinued GARM in August 2024 (opens in a new tab). Its Brand Safety Floor and Suitability Framework is a legacy reference, not an operating standard or certification. No single body replaced it. In practice the floor a campaign runs on is built from four layers, and each one is set by a different party.
| Layer | Example document | What it decides | Who can change it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Law | Statutes in each country, state or province where the ad runs | Content that is illegal to publish or to promote | Legislators and courts |
| Platform policy | Google Publisher Policies; YouTube advertiser-friendly content guidelines | Content the platform will not place ads on at all | The platform |
| Industry reference | The legacy floor framework; IAB Tech Lab Content Taxonomy Sensitive Topics | A shared description that tools and contracts can point to | The body that maintains it, if any |
| Advertiser policy | The brand's own floor document | Which references the brand adopts and any items it adds | The brand, with its agency |
Who decides matters in a new way in the United States. In September 2025 the FTC approved a final consent order (opens in a new tab) in a merger of two large advertising agency groups. The order bars the merged company from denying advertising dollars to media publishers based on their political or ideological viewpoint, except at the express and individualized direction of its advertiser customers. This is one reason a floor document records which party made each exclusion decision, and when.
How is the floor different from content a platform only restricts?
Platforms run their own floor before any buyer setting applies, and they split sensitive content into two groups. Content in the first group gets no ads. Content in the second can still earn ads, but from fewer sources. A buyer's floor has to cover the second group, because the platform will not remove it.
| Surface and document | No ads | Fewer or limited ads |
|---|---|---|
| Sites and apps that monetize with Google ad code: Google Publisher Policies and Restrictions | Policies cover content that “is illegal, promotes illegal activity, or infringes on the legal rights of others”, plus dangerous or derogatory and sexually explicit content. Failure to comply may result in Google blocking ads. | Restrictions cover sexual content, shocking content, explosives, guns, tobacco, recreational drugs, alcohol, online gambling and prescription drugs, where fewer advertising sources are eligible to bid. |
| YouTube: advertiser-friendly content guidelines | Videos and Shorts marked as content that “will receive no ad earnings” | Content that “will receive limited ad earnings”, across topics such as violence, controversial issues and sensitive events |
Restricted is not the same as unsafe. A news site's report on a firearms law or a recipe that uses wine can fall under a restriction and still sit above the floor. The Google Publisher Restrictions (opens in a new tab) page says publishers can choose to monetize such content, so buyers decide the rest through their own suitability settings, described in the brand suitability guide.
How should a brand document its brand safety floor?
A floor that lives only in platform settings is hard to audit and easy to lose when a team changes. A short written document fixes that. TAG's Brand Safety Certified guidelines (opens in a new tab) give a useful model even for companies that are not certified: buyers must document how they maintain inclusion and exclusion lists, and explain how keywords, categories and properties are added and removed.
Five steps to a floor document a client can approve
- Pick one reference list. Choose the framework's 12 categories or the taxonomy's 11 and say so on the first line.
- Quote the floor wording. For each category, copy the reference's own floor description instead of paraphrasing it.
- Add brand specific floor items. Write down anything the brand treats as unfit for any of its ads, with the reason, and mark it as an addition.
- Map each item to the platforms. For every buying platform, name the setting or list that enforces the item and the date it was checked.
- Record decisions and changes. Note who approved the document, which party directed each exclusion, and every later edit with its date.
| Field | What to write | Sample entry |
|---|---|---|
| Reference | The list and version the floor follows | Legacy framework, 12 categories |
| Category and wording | The category name and its floor text, quoted | Spam or harmful content: malware and phishing |
| Enforcement | Platform, setting or list, and date checked | Display buys: account exclusion list, checked October 2026 |
| Additions | Brand specific items and the reason | Child sexual abuse and exploitation, also a Google publisher policy area |
| Decision owner | The person and party who directed it | Brand marketing director, on behalf of the advertiser |
| Change log | Each edit, its date and its approver | Misinformation item added, agency planner, approved by client |
What does a floor document look like for a family brand?
Fictional example
A fictional wooden toy maker in Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island
A fictional maker of wooden toys sells through its own website and small shops in Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island. Its brief to the agency says “no violence, nothing adult, nothing scary.” The planner's first job is to sort those words into floor and suitability.
The floor document follows the 12 category list and quotes the floor wording for each. It adds one brand item, adult themes presented as family content, because Google's publisher policies already name adult themes in family content as a policy area and the client wants the same line on every platform. The brief's “nothing scary” is moved out of the floor into the suitability settings, where it becomes a low tolerance for dramatized violence and for depictions of death or injury.
The client's marketing lead signs the document. When the client later asks to add a misinformation item, the change log records the request, the date and the approver, so any reviewer can see the decision was the advertiser's own.
How does PlacementGraph treat content below the floor?
Frequently asked questions
Can an advertiser choose to advertise below the floor?
The MRC's 2018 supplement says advertisers may choose to forgo the agreed floor and allow advertising in one or more floor categories. In practice platform policies still apply, and Google says content that breaks its publisher policies may have ads blocked, so a buyer setting cannot reopen what the platform has already closed.
Is misinformation below the brand safety floor?
In the framework copy, yes: its floor describes “verifiably false or willfully misleading content that is directly connected to user or societal harm.” The IAB Tech Lab taxonomy's Sensitive Topics branch has no misinformation category. Because tools and lists differ, the floor document should state whether the brand includes it and who decided.
Is the floor the same in the United States and Canada?
The categories are the same, but the law layer is not. The framework's floor for illegal drugs notes that federal jurisdiction applies but allows content where legal local jurisdiction can be effectively managed. What is illegal differs by country, state and province, so a cross-border floor records which jurisdiction each legal item follows.
Does the floor apply to user generated content and comments?
Yes. The MRC supplement says a property classified as unsafe should stay classified that way even if safe content appears on it, and it names user generated content on social platforms. Forums and comment sections change quickly, so a floor document should say how often those placements are checked and by whom.
Sources
- Brand Safety Floor + Suitability Framework (opens in a new tab)Brand Safety Institute
- WFA discontinues GARM (opens in a new tab)World Federation of Advertisers, August 9, 2024
- Content Taxonomy 3.1 (Sensitive Topics branch) (opens in a new tab)IAB Tech Lab, GitHub
- Brand Safety Certified Guidelines, version 5.0 (opens in a new tab)TAG (Trustworthy Accountability Group), July 2026
- FTC Alters Final Consent Order in Response to Public Comments, Preventing Coordination in Global Advertising Merger (opens in a new tab)Federal Trade Commission, September 26, 2025
- Google Publisher Policies (opens in a new tab)Google Publisher Policies Help
- Google Publisher Restrictions (opens in a new tab)Google Publisher Policies Help
- Advertiser-friendly content guidelines (opens in a new tab)YouTube Help
- MRC Ad Verification Supplement: Enhanced Content Level Context and Brand Safety (September 2018) (opens in a new tab)Media Rating Council
Researched and written by PlacementGraph Research. Read how we research, source and update these pages. Corrections: diana@placementgraph.com.