Click Fraud at 15.8%

[Kenny]

The Click Fraud Index™ monitors and reports on data gathered from the Click Fraud Network™, which more than 4,000 online advertisers and their agencies have joined. The Network provides statistically significant pay-per-click data collected from online advertising campaigns for both large and small companies.

Key findings from data reported for Q2 2007 include:

The overall industry average click fraud rate was 15.8 percent for Q2 2007. This is an increase from 14.1 percent for the same quarter in 2006 and 14.8 percent for Q1 2007.

The average click fraud rate of PPC advertisements appearing on search engine content networks, including Google AdSense and the Yahoo Publisher Network, was 25.6 percent. That’s up from 21.9 percent for Q1 2007 and 19.2 percent for Q4 of 2006.

Traffic from botnets doubled from Q1 to Q2 2007 and contributed significantly to the increase in click fraud rates.

In Q2 2007, the greatest percentage of click fraud originating from countries outside North America came from France (5.1 percent), China (3.2 percent) and Australia (3 percent).

“We’re not surprised to see the industry average click fraud rate climb this quarter as a result of botnet activity,” said Robert Hansen, CEO of SecTheory and one of the industry’s leading experts in online security threats. “Our clients are well aware that botnet activity is on the rise and that botnets are being used for a variety of online fraud activities, including click fraud.”

The FBI recently reported that botnets – which are used to facilitate crimes, such as spam, identity theft, denial of service attacks, phishing, spyware distribution and now click fraud – have infiltrated more than 1 million U.S. computers. Their sophistication and growing numbers are making it harder for search engines to identify click fraud originating from these sources – especially when they lack the crucial data needed from the advertiser web sites.

“Click fraud has become the new spam and it’s clearly a problem that is getting worse, not better,” said Tom Cuthbert, president and CEO of Click Forensics, Inc. “A significant percentage of today’s click fraud traffic can be attributed to two growing areas of concern for search advertisers – traffic that comes from botnets and from parked domains or made-for-ad sites. Advertisers running campaigns on content networks are especially vulnerable as they are increasingly targets of this growing pool of savvy fraudsters.”

The Click Fraud Index publishes data collected from the Click Fraud Network, the industry’s first independent third-party click fraud detection service dedicated to helping companies more accurately monitor their online advertising campaigns for pay-per-click fraud. Click fraud data is tracked and published on a quarterly basis for specific search providers, industries and trends. The service is unique in that it monitors online campaigns for click fraud by correlating data collected from search provider campaigns and the advertisers’ own web sites – providing the industry’s most accurate view of click fraud to date.

Check out the source for xlnt geo graphics...

http://clickfraudnetwork.com/content/ClickFraudIndex.aspx

Cy

 

[bfluid]

 

[.X.]

Nice read, Thanks Cyber :tu:

 

[Kenny]

Nice read, Thanks Tommy :tu:

Tommy?

 

[bfluid]

Tommy?

LOL! rofl

 

[kemjika11]

I just translate click fraud as one of costs and bad sides of online advertising. Just as banks suffer from fraud, etc. Online advertising is making alot more money today than it did before too, so even though there's more illegal activity, profits are still high and advertisers are still doing ok to say the least.

 

[.X.]

Tommy?

Sorry..Cyber.. was regging names, and was thinking of someone else

 

[SharonTucci]

I really hate that domainers are taking so much flack for this.... I do a good deal of advertising on Adwords and honestly, I have many more problems with low return on CONTENT sites running adsense than I do with parked pages. For adult ad campaigns I've run, PARKED pages actually outperform on a conversion basis versus adsense and ads on Google itself and their search partners. By outperform, I am talking that I get a higher conversion rate from click throughs alone (not taking into account the cost factor).

 

[NameCharger]

As long as it's a human doing the clicking and that human is not the publisher. A click is a click and THE ADVERTISER GETS EXPOSURE whether it's from a 1000+ page original content site, 4 page minisite, MFA site, or parked page. All of these sources lead to successful sales. End of story.

You don't see magazine publishers refunding advertisers money or penalizing stores that sell magazines because every person who buys or looks at a magazine doesn't buy all their products in the magazine.

Likewise with television advertising and radio advertising.

Advertising is, and always will be a risk. The middle men need to stop throwing the publishers under the bus (who spend precious time and $$$ developing and promoting the ADVERTISERS goods and services).

 

[nicedomains]

As long as it's a human doing the clicking and that human is not the publisher. A click is a click and THE ADVERTISER GETS EXPOSURE whether it's from a 1000+ page original content site, 4 page minisite, MFA site, or parked page. All of these sources lead to successful sales. End of story.

Isn't this the issue with click fraud though? A click is a click but it is not worth anything if it is a botnet or publisher doing the clicking..

Advertising is, and always will be a risk. The middle men need to stop throwing the publishers under the bus (who spend precious time and $$$ developing and promoting the ADVERTISERS goods and services).

I agree with this! Shame on you dishonest middle men clickers :td:

The average click fraud rate of PPC advertisements appearing on search engine content networks, including Google AdSense and the Yahoo Publisher Network, was 25.6 percent. That’s up from 21.9 percent for Q1 2007 and 19.2 percent for Q4 of 2006.

This is an alarming rate! Something will have to change soon right? Good info though!

 

[labrocca]

Personally I think we should firewall out every country with a high click-fraud rate. Or at the very least Google should. The networks (YPN for example) expect that your site will block ad display to non english speaking countries but in reality it would be very easy for them to do it on their end. THEY serve the ads. A quick check for IP range would eliminate imho about 1/2 the fraud immediately...possibly more.

If was to advertise in a network I would hope to be able to only display my ads to countries I choose. However it's not that way. I don't bother anymore running ads with Adwords as I suspect too much click fraud and have rarely seen a positive result from spending hundreds of dollars. Better off buying good links that will help be get ranked higher in SERPs.

 

[d_0118]

I personally do not think that search engines should firewall the whole country simply because of high click fraud due to statistics, but they should definately do something as webmasters get cheated by receiving bot visitors instead of real people.

 

[NameCharger]

Personally I think we should firewall out every country with a high click-fraud rate. Or at the very least Google should. The networks (YPN for example) expect that your site will block ad display to non english speaking countries but in reality it would be very easy for them to do it on their end. THEY serve the ads. A quick check for IP range would eliminate imho about 1/2 the fraud immediately...possibly more.

Excellent idea, I think they should filter out every country they pay out $0.00 per click, but wouldn't that mean that Google would lose revenue on the AdWords end?

Filtering out IP blocks = no impressions = no clicks = no traffic quality adjustments while keeping a portion of the AdWords/AdSense margin

 

[labrocca]

Excellent idea, I think they should filter out every country they pay out $0.00 per click, but wouldn't that mean that Google would lose revenue on the AdWords end?

Filtering out IP blocks = no impressions = no clicks = no traffic quality adjustments while keeping a portion of the AdWords/AdSense margin

Exactly why they won't do it and why click fraud is on the rise. They really DO NOT want to stop it. It's revenue for them...screw the advertiser plain and simple.

 

[geb9696]

I think it is somewhat shocking that 25% of YPN and Adsense is click-fraud. That is 1 out of every 4 clicks is fraudulent. If I was advertising and I was seeing that high of fraud rates I would be extremely angry. The other alarming thing was that click fraud is steedily on the rise. I wonder how long this will keep up before Google/Yahoo make major changes.

 

[NickRac]

I hate people who ruin it for the rest of us...imagine how much more we'd be paid per click if we didn't have to deal with all the scammers and frauders

 

[Dave_Z]

And by sheer coincidence:

http://www.namepros.com/industry-news/363772-google-opens-traffic-quality-center.html

Courtesy of Cy.

 

[kanoodledood]

Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don't know which half.

John Wanamaker
US department store merchant (1838 - 1922)

 

[ehoez.com]

yea, they blame us