A redirected URL is reviewed at its destination, not where it was submitted
The requirementstatement
Where a submitted URL redirects off the registered domain, the full content review applies to the destination, so the destination is what the registration must be able to survive.
- Severityseverity
- BlockingBLOCKINGBreaking this rule gets the submission rejected. There is no partial credit.
- When it bitesphase
- Gates approvalapprovalGet this wrong and the brand or campaign is refused at registration.
- What is checkedobject
- brand.website redirect chain
- Where it liveslayer
- WebsiteWEBSITE
- How Ekas settles itdetectability
- DeterministicDETERMINISTIC
- Settled in code from the values you submitted. No model involved, no judgement call, same answer every time.
- What the fix involvesfailureClass
- Fix the fieldRETRY_FIELD
- A better value in the form fixes it. Ekas can rewrite it and re-check.
- Who requires itauthorities
- CTIAAT&T
- When it appliesapplicabilityText
- Applies to every 10DLC registration.
Why this rule existsrationale
Reviewers follow the chain and judge whatever they land on, which means a brand can be assessed against a site it did not submit and does not control — a marketing shortener, an agency landing page, a marketplace storefront. The business believes its own site was reviewed and cannot understand the finding, because nothing in the rejection names the page that produced it.
How to fix itremediation
Register the URL the chain actually ends on, or remove the off-domain hop so the submitted address serves the content directly. Done when brand.website and the final URL of the fetch are the same registrable domain.
A compliant exampleexample
brand.website: https://acmecoffee.com — fetch ends on acmecoffee.com, not on a link-shortener or an agency landing page.
Common mistakespitfalls
- Pointing the registration at the destination fixes this and can still fail WEB-077 if the destination belongs to a different business — moving the URL does not change whose site is being judged.
Notesnotes
A scoping rule: it changes what every other content check reads. Fenced against its two neighbours — WEB-075 fails any redirect at all because TCR forbids 30x on a fetched URL, and WEB-077 judges whether the destination is an unrelated brand. This one is the mechanical fact that the destination is a different domain, which is what makes the other two matter.
Rules you will hit next
Other website rules at the same severity. A registration is judged as a whole, not rule by rule.
WEB-001A brand website URL is requiredBlockingBLOCKINGWEB-009The website must resolve and return contentBlockingBLOCKINGWEB-012A parked or for-sale domain is not a websiteBlockingBLOCKINGWEB-013A pre-launch placeholder is not a websiteBlockingBLOCKINGWEB-014Staging, admin and internal hosts must not be the brand websiteBlockingBLOCKINGWEB-016The website must be machine-crawlableBlockingBLOCKING
WEB-079 is one of 93 website rules in the 915-rule 10DLC registry. Free to cite under CC BY 4.0.