ICYMI ("In Case You Missed It") the ad fraud, that is.

Trying something new here: highlighting key points from articles I have written in the past.

Ad Fraud Is So Normalized, You Don’t Even See It While Staring Right At It - https://www.forbes.com/sites/augustinefou/2021/03/21/ad-fraud-is-so-normalized-you-dont-even-see-it-while-staring-right-at-it

"Interestingly, just like the problem of counterfeit handbags has not gone away, the problem of digital ad fraud (counterfeit ads) has not gone away. That's because people WANT to buy low cost "Cucci" handbags from Canal Street in New York City, and digital marketers WANT to buy low cost digital ads from programmatic sources. They look similar enough to the real thing, after all. But counterfeit handbags may give the consumer the appearance of having luxury products, but counterfeit ads give advertisers nothing -- i.e. no business outcomes -- just numbers on a dashboard or spreadsheet."

New Threat Vectors Brand Protection Officers Need To Know About - https://www.forbes.com/sites/augustinefou/2021/12/29/new-threat-vectors-brand-protection-officers-need-to-know-about/

"The threat to big brand advertisers from digital ad fraud goes beyond some ads showing up next to beheading videos and child abuse content. The enormous profits from digital ad fraud are fueling many other forms of crime that directly harm consumers. For example, swarms of fake ecommerce sites using pictures of brand name products, at 90% off, are tricking consumers into voluntarily giving their credit card numbers and real home addresses. The fraudsters are harvesting these and never delivering any of the orders. By the time the consumers realize they got ripped off, the fake ecommerce site is gone,and there's no one to complain to. The consumers then blame the brand or at the very least have a negative brand association -- they got ripped off when buying this brand name product. Digital ad fraud has been fueling an explosion in other forms of crime and online scams, like the above."

All Ad Fraud Looks The Same, If You Look - https://www.forbes.com/sites/augustinefou/2021/01/27/all-ad-fraud-looks-the-same-if-you-look

"We've seen this movie over and over and over again. Digital ad fraud is just like many forms of crime before it -- from Madoff's ponzi scheme, to Theranos' selling vaporware, to all the big banks bundling junk mortgages in with some good ones and ratings agencies rating the bundles as triple-A. In digital, it's just a whole lot easier, because everything is bots and bytes, oops "bits and bytes," and numbers on spreadsheets. Remember the Uber case, where mobile ad vendors simply made up "transparency reports" without even running any ads?

Which Form Of Crime Is Digital Ad Fraud? - https://www.forbes.com/sites/augustinefou/2020/06/03/which-form-of-crime-is-digital-ad-fraud

"The question is, which form of crime is digital ad fraud? There are no specific laws against digital ad fraud; but there probably should be, because digital ad fraud looks a whole lot like counterfeit goods, mass copyright infringement, computer crimes, wire fraud, and fraud -- yeah, all of the above, at the same time."

Fraud As Old As Time... Digital's The Perfect Crime - https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/fraud-old-time-digitals-perfect-crime-ad-fraud-researcher/

If there were ever a "perfect crime," digital ad fraud is probably the closest you''ll get to that. It's easy to do, easy to get away with, and highly profitable. The criminals are not even making an effort to hide. In fact, "Boris, Daniel, Asher, and Matt" all talked with reporters openly and bragged about the massive numbers of ads they were able to create and the big money they made from doing so. Do you know of any other criminal enterprise where the perps openly brag about their successes?"

So what?

So where do we go from here? Clearly, big fraud numbers don't scare anyone into action. The number published by CHEQ yesterday was $142 billion lost to fraud per year. Who cares? It's someone else's problem right? Ad fraud doesn't affect your campaigns, because DV or IAS reports said it was 1% or less, right? It's time to grow up and do real digital marketing. The "digital marketing" we've been doing for the last decade was like playing a video game -- where higher scores win, and larger vanity metrics like more impressions, more clicks, more traffic appear to be winning. It wasn't your fault. The tools you had at your disposal were limited and you were limited by those tools. Time to upgrade your tools -- for example to FouAnalytics -- so you can see better, and do better. Time to do better digital marketing.

Still don't believe me? Let me show you, via a no-cost pilot.

See: No Cost Pilot for Advertisers - https://www.dhirubhai.net/posts/augustinefou_no-cost-pilot-with-fouanalytics-for-advertisers-activity-7028399311801458688-eZvc