Firebolt: the fastest, safest ads on the web
by Dane Knecht
Cloudflare’s mission is to help build a better Internet. That means a faster, more secure, open Internet world-wide. We have millions of customers using our services like free SSL, an advanced WAF, the latest compression and the most up to date security to ensure that their web sites, mobile apps and APIs are secure and fast.
One vital area of web technology has lagged behind in terms of speed and security: online ads. And consumers have been turning to ad blocking technology to secure and speed up their own web browsing.
Today, Cloudflare is introducing a new product to make web ads secure, fast and safe. That product is Firebolt.
Firebolt
With Firebolt, ad networks can instantly speed up and secure their ads, resulting in happy consumers and better conversion rates.
Firebolt delivers:
Lightning fast ad delivery
Cloudflare’s global network of 102 data centers in 50 countries, combined with routing and performance technologies, makes the delivery of online ads to any device up to five times faster.
Free, simple SSL
Adding SSL to ad serving has been challenging for some ad networks. Cloudflare has years of experience providing free, one click SSL for our customers. Firebolt ads are automatically available over SSL with no complex process of getting and maintaining SSL certificates.
Firebolt includes AMP for Ads
Firebolt enables any independent ad network to leverage the new AMP ad format easily. This makes it possible for ads to appear in AMP content served by Google and an increasing number of sites. Firebolt is the only independent way to serve the newly announced AMP for Ads outside of Google’s advertising network.
Cryptographically signed ads
All ad content delivered by Firebolt for AMP for Ads is cryptographically signed to ensure that it meets the required format and security standards. Signed ads reduce the risk of malware and increase confidence in ads for consumers.
The most advanced browser security
Firebolt ads take advantage of web browser security features including CORS, X-Content-Type-Options and Strict-Transport-Security to ensure the integrity of ads delivered to browsers.
A faster, safer Internet for everyone
Firebolt takes us one step closer to making the Internet a better place by benefitting everyone in the ad ecosystem, including the consumer.
During a recent test, ad platform TripleLift used Cloudflare’s Firebolt to serve AMP ads on Time Inc.’s properties. Ads loaded six times faster and Time Inc. saw 13 percent more revenue relative to traditional ads. “Cloudflare was easy to set up, and we saw an impressive difference in the speed of ad delivery with Firebolt’s support for AMP for Ads,” said Shaun Zacharia, co-founder and President of TripleLift. “AMP Ads loaded six times faster and were three times lighter than comparable standard ads.”
If you are an ad network or publisher, please reach out to [email protected] to learn more about Firebolt and how Cloudflare can help you monetize the Internet content we all rely on.
Originally published at blog.cloudflare.com on January 30, 2017.
