According to Statista, the estimated cost of digital ad fraud worldwide was 35 billion in 2018. Not concerned yet? What if we told you, it’s expected the cost would triple by 2023 to 100 billion? If you’re worried now, you rightfully should be as fraudsters are continuously finding new ways to carry out ad fraud. Before we dive into what you can do about it, let’s break down what this all means.
What is Ad Fraud?
Ad fraud is an action that isn’t what it appears to be. Instead of being generated by interested consumers, as it should be, it’s ad traffic and site conversions that come from bots, data centers, compromised devices, click farms, and other unscrupulous sources. Fraudsters try to delude advertisers with leads and traffic that are fake, thereby wreaking havoc on your ad spend.
Ad fraud can be a huge headache for you and your team and can leave you scrambling to make up for lost time and money. Protecting against ad fraud is crucial to the success of your marketing campaigns.
How is Ad Fraud Being Committed?
- Domain Spoofing
In ad fraud, domain spoofing is when a publisher says in the real-time bidding (RTB) ad request that an ad will run on a certain domain, but the ad actually ends up going on a different one. This practice is frequently used by sites that have been blacklisted by buyers due to their content (phishing, viruses, spyware, etc.).
- Click Fraud
Click fraud is the act of an individual or bot actively exploiting advertisers by clicking on a pay-per-click (PPC) advertisement thereby diminishing the advertising budget or generating fake charges.
- Cookie Stuffing
Cookies are often used by advertisers via their affiliate marketing program as a tracking tool. Cookie stuffing occurs when the fraudster inserts multiple tracking cookies to a visitor of a website simultaneously on the chance that the visitor then proceeds to move on to a site with an affiliate program in the future. Because the visitor’s browser now contains a tracking cookie, the affiliate program then attributes the visit to the cookie stuffer, despite never having promoted the site. The fraudster essentially steals credits for leads and sales from honest affiliates.
- Ad Stacking
Quite literal in its term, ad stacking refers to the stacking of multiple ads on top of each other in an ad placement with only one ad being visible. Once a visitor clicks on the ad, all ads in the stack are forced to pay for each impression or click. Fraudsters are constantly attacking new ways to commit ad fraud, and ad stacking generates revenue for the unviewed ads.
Detecting Ad Fraud
Some signs that ad fraud may be taking place is the detection of inconsistent browser sessions, IP addresses from data centers, bad device reputations, geo mismatches, and over 40 different anomalies in organic traffic patterns and online behavior we’ve identified at Fraudlogix.
Working with fraud detection experts can help prevent bots from hijacking your marketing campaigns. Our fraud-fighting solutions will allow you to know if your ads are— being seen by actual humans, appearing on brand-safe sites, within view, are running on the correct sites, all while getting a detailed analysis of transactions on your ads with the ability to block and identify fraud as it happens.
To protect against ad fraud, detect it before it becomes a problem with our programmatic ad fraud solutions.
Stop Ad Fraud Before It’s Too Late
At Fraudlogix, we fight ad fraud in all its forms. We develop custom fraud prevention solutions for the unique needs of each of our clients. Sign up now for a free test or contact us to let us know how we can help you detect ad fraud. Keep ad fraud from hurting your marketing campaigns with ad fraud detection solutions from Fraudlogix.
