Return Path has updated the Certification Requirements. The document includes comprehensive information for senders who are interested in understanding Certification: what the program is, what the audit process is like, and the necessary requirements to become and stay Certified. 

Highlights of the new standards include: 

1. Domain ownership: To be approved into the program, Certification Senders must prove ownership of their domains. WHOIS domain verification may be supplemented with a DNS token authentication to prove this ownership.

2. Privacy policy: To be approved into the program, Senders must have a privacy policy; however, it is no longer required at every point of email address collection.

3. Point of collection: To be approved into the program, Senders no longer need to specifically disclose the types of email they are sending at the point of collection of email addresses.

4. Third-party mail: Senders can now send third-party content from their Certified IPs. Third-party mailers, as a business entity, continue to be ineligible for Certification.

5. Secure websites: In order to ensure the security of recipients' email addresses, Sender website(s) must use https:// authentication.

6. Attachments: Email attachments, regardless of file type, are prohibited.

Updated Certification Requirements

Attached below are copies of our up-to-date Certification Requirements for 2020, as well as the 2019 requirements for comparison. The 2020 requirements will supersede the 2019 requirements beginning March 12, 2020. Current applicants will need to meet these standards before being approved. Senders already in the Certification program will have 30 days to make sure they meet these standards.