Ad Fraud: Types
Ad fraud is a serious issue that plagues the digital advertising industry. With billions of dollars at stake, fraudsters are constantly coming up with new schemes to deceive advertisers and steal their money.
From bot traffic to click farms to ad stacking, there are various types of ad fraud that can significantly impact publishers and their revenue. In this post, we will explore the different types of ad fraud, how they mess with publishers, and most importantly, how to stop them.
So get ready to dive into the sneaky world of ad fraud!
Types of Desktop Ad Fraud
1. Click Farms
Click farms can be compared to sweatshops when it comes to ad fraud. They employ low-paid people who get money from clicking on ads, creating false impressions and engagement. It’s one of the most difficult ad fraud types to fight. Clicks are from real humans, so they go undetected by traditional fraud detection systems.
Publishers unknowingly pay for these fraudulent clicks, leading to significant financial losses.
2. Ad Stacking
In ad stacking, only the ad on top is visible. If the user clicks on it, all the ads in the stack count a click. If the user sees one of them, then all ad stack are registered as viewed. And you never know how many ads are layering on top of each other.
This advertising fraud aims to inflate ad impressions, as advertisers are charged for impressions even if they are never seen by real users.?
3. Pixel Stuffing
Pixel stuffing is the practice of placing more than one ad into a single 1x1 pixel area.
The embedded ads are not visible to the user, but just by visiting those sites, an impression will be count as a viewed.
Frauds use this technique to trigger impressions from a much higher number of ads, then there is room for on a publisher’s website.
4. Domain spoofing
Domain spoofing is a fraud type where fraudsters pretend to represent a premium publisher.
They disguise their real URL to legitimate and trusted websites.
?As a result, frauds tricking users, advertisers, and the publisher:
5. Cookie Stuffing
Advertisers pay for impressions based on tracking cookies, but these cookies are often stuffed into users' browsers without their knowledge, leading to inaccurate attribution.
The cookie contains false information that says the user was convinced by the affiliate and clicked through from the latter’s site.?This is a common practice in affiliate marketing.
Cookies could be "stuffed" or "dropped" into a browser using a variety of methods, including:
6. Ad Injection
Ad injection is the unauthorized placement of ads on websites without the publisher's consent.?
These ads are usually injected by malicious browser extensions.
Extensions that inject ads can not only replace legitimate ads with malicious ones but also alter the publisher's original content.
Publishers lose out on potential ad revenue and user engagement as their legitimate ads are crowded out by unauthorized and irrelevant ads.
To prevent this, install software only from unreliable sites.
领英推荐
Types of Mobile Ad Fraud
Why should every publisher worry about Mobile Ad Fraud, even if they don't have a mobile app?
Let's break it down: ?In 2023, more then 50% of website visits happens on mobiles. With this major change, it's critical to know how fraud can hurt your business.
Common Types
1. Click Injection
Click injection is a sophisticated attribution fraud in which scammers manipulate last-click attribution in Android devices to demand credit from the actual source of an install (for example, organic campaigns)
It gives marketers incorrect data and can lead them to waste their budget on ineffective campaigns, giving money to fraudsters.
2. Geo Masking
CPMs and CPC can vary widely based on the specific traffic geo.?
Fraud use geo masking to make low-quality traffic appear as high-quality, so they can sell it to advertisers for higher prices. It’s done by swapping the IP addresses of users.?
As a result, advertisers are paying several times more for low-quality traffic than its real value.
3. Bot Traffic
One of the most common types of ad fraud, bot traffic refers to fake traffic generated by automated bots. These bots mimic human behavior and click on ads, leading to inflated click counts and false engagement metrics.
Publishers end up paying for these fake clicks, resulting in wasted ad spend and reduced ROI.
4. Device Farms
Device farms are a collection of devices that are all programmed to install, and then reset and repeat.
This is similar to Click Farms but worse because owners of such companies can have an unlimited number of devices.
5. SDK Spoofing
SDK spoofing involves creating a bot in an app that initiates fake clicks and app installs. Also known as traffic spoofing, SDK spoofing can trick advertisers into paying for app installs - sometimes in the tens of thousands - that never happened.
6. Fake Installs:
Scammers use bots to download apps, creating the illusion that the app is more popular than it actually is.?
Fake installs defraud advertisers, publishers, and ad networks, resulting in lost ad spend.
Impact of Ad Fraud
What you can do to prevent ad fraud?