Core Value Proposition
- Prevent data leakage by permissioning user IDs to authorized partners only
- Ensure compliance with data privacy regulations thanks to ID5’s privacy-by-design technology
- Identify authenticated and unauthenticated users in all digital advertising environments to increase monetization
ID5 ID Overview
The ID5 ID is a shared, neutral identifier that allows publishers and ad tech platforms to recognise users in environments where third-party cookies are unavailable. ID5 enables publishers to generate and distribute a common first-party identifier across the ecosystem. Ad tech partners integrated with ID5 can decrypt the ID5 ID, provided they have the appropriate user and publisher consent, to enhance their ability to recognise users. The ID5 ID is built to honour user privacy choices and publisher preferences at every stage of the advertising value chain.
How does the ID5 ID work?
The ID5 ID provides a common, privacy-conscious identifier that replaces the need for ad tech platforms to maintain and sync their own proprietary user IDs. Instead of each platform speaking its own identity “language,” the ID5 ID gives the entire ecosystem a shared way to recognise users, even where third-party cookies or device identifiers are not available.
Once implemented, publishers can expose the ID5 ID to partners to increase addressability and serves as a stable key for building, targeting, and activating audiences. Partners can pass the encrypted ID through their existing tags or pixels and in the bid stream enabling them to reliably identify users for audience creation, data activation, bidding, optimisation, and measurement across all environments.
The ID5 ID can be used alongside the ID5 Identity Graph, to support people-based advertising strategies..
Solution Overview

ID5 Integration Overview
Phase 1: Deploy & Distribute
- Deploy the ID5 ID across your user base using the Prebid.js User ID module, ID5 JS API, Mobile In App and CTV APIs or through one of our integration partners such as Google or Amazon Publisher Services. Ensure you share the ID5 ID in the user.eids field in OpenRTB bid requests using these instructions.
- Tell your platform partners that you have integrated with ID5 and the ID5 ID is now available for all of your users.
Phase 2: Measure
- Deploy the Prebid Analytics module alongside AB Testing and work with your Account Manager to analyse the value of ID5 on your business.
Phase 3: Read & Use
- Publishers with many properties can decrypt the ID5 ID to access the persistent identifier and use it as a basis for building and targeting audiences, optimising campaigns as well as measurement and attribution across properties.
- Encourage your platform partners to decrypt the ID5 ID and use it as a basis for building and targeting audiences, executing programmatic deals, optimising campaigns as well as measurement and attribution. Refer to our integration guides for SSPs, DSPs and Data Platforms.
Deploying the ID5 ID
Contract
Before getting started with deploying the ID5 ID, we need to make sure you have signed a Site Agreement and have been issued an ID5 Partner Number. If you are not already integrated with ID5, reach out to contact@id5.io or sign the agreement and we’ll get you set up right away.
Deployment
There are multiple ways to deploy the ID5 ID across your properties as outlined below. Where possible, we recommend passing additional signals such as hashed email addresses and MAIDS in requests to ID5 to enhance the accuracy of reconciling consented users across domains and devices.
Prebid.js User ID Module
If you are using Prebid.js, you can deploy the ID5 ID by including both the userId and id5IdSystem modules, in addition to the other modules you normally include in your prebid configuration. Full instructions can be found in our Prebid documentation.
ID5 JS API
If you are not using Prebid.js, you can install the ID5 JS API directly on your page after your CMP (if applicable), but as high in the <head> as possible. Full instructions can be found on our GitHub page.
Mobile App Deployment
ID5 can be deployed in the mobile in app environment. For a complete guide to the specifics of integrating in-app, please see our Mobile In-App Integration page.
CTV Deployment
The ID5 ID can be deployed in CTV environment as outline here.
Inform your partners
Once the ID5 ID has been deployed across your sites, we recommend you reach out to your ad tech partners to let them know that you have integrated with ID5 and have the ID5 ID deployed. Please contact your ID5 Account Manager if you would like assistance with content for this communication.
For an optimal integration, your:
- SSP partners should be retrieving the ID using the Prebid.js Bid Adapter and/or the ID5 JS API and sending them to DSPs via OpenRTB bid requests.
- Data Platform partners should be using the ID as a basis for building audience segments and syncing with your SSP and DSP partners.
- DSP partners should be decrypting the ID5 IDs they are receiving in OpenRTB bid requests and using it in their bidding logic as well as to communicate identity with their other platform partners including data management platforms.
Measure the Value of the ID
To help publishers better understand the value of working with ID5, we have launched an Analytics Module for Prebid. With just a few additional lines of configuration, publishers can use ID5's analytics platform to dig into the data without having to build their own reporting tools.
Read and Use the ID5 ID
Publishers operating across multiple environments may wish to use the ID5 ID combined with the ID5 graph to build audience segments and activate omnichannel campaigns. To enable this, the ID5 ID must be decrypted so that the underlying persistent identifier can be accessed. Once decrypted, the ID5 ID can be used in conjunction with the ID5 graph which aggregated ID5 ID into individuals and household to support omnichannel audience creation, campaign optimisation, measurement, and attribution.
Privacy & Regulations
Privacy-by-Design
ID5 has built a privacy-by-design shared ID service for publishers and ad tech vendors. Our service leverages the IAB’s Transparency and Consent Framework (TCF) and US Privacy Framework to capture the user’s privacy preferences.
As a shared ID provider, ID5 acts as a Controller of the ID5 ID, and thus, we must receive a valid legal basis to process requests. When we receive a request for the ID5 ID, we check that we have a legal basis to store our user ID in a cookie before proceeding; if we don’t have one, we do not read our cookie or write to it as part of the HTTP response.
When ID5 returns an ID to the page, the value is encrypted in such a way that only platforms that have authorization to process data (based on the consumer’s and publisher’s privacy preferences) are able to decrypt the string back to a stable ID. By doing so, ID5 enforces privacy preferences and regulations, ensuring that no downstream party can understand the ID without the proper legal basis to do so. When the ID is non-decryptable, the request is truly anonymized, preventing any personal data from being retrieved or processed.
Privacy Policy
For further information please visit our Platform Privacy Policy, please visit https://id5.io/platform-privacy-policy and Privacy API documentation.