Ad fraud


Ad fraud '' is concerned with theory and practice of fraudulently representing online advertisement impressions, clicks, conversion or data events in order to generate revenue. While ad fraud is more generally associated with banner ads, video ads and in-app ads, click fraud has been associated with search marketing, mobile advertising and conversion fraud with affiliate marketing. AppsFlyer estimates financial exposure to app install fraud in Q1 of 2018 was as much as $800 million.
Ad fraud is the categorical term inclusive of all forms of online advertising fraud. In 2004 Google's CFO George Reyes said that fraud is the biggest threat to internet economy with the first research paper covering the topic in 1999 or earlier. In 2016 World Federation of Advertisers published its first guidance on Ad fraud to advise its members on how to counter the problem allegedly eating close to US$20 billion of its members ad budgets in 2015.

Comparison with other Cybercrime

In a 2017 report Juniper Research estimates ad fraud to be worth US$19billion equivalent to $51 million per day. This figure, representing advertising on online and mobile devices, will continue to rise, reaching $44 billion by 2022. Ad fraud is the #1 cybercrime in terms of revenue, ahead of Tax-refund fraud. HP Enterprise in its Business of Hacking report highlighted ad fraud as the easiest and the most lucrative form of Cybercrime.

Important Classifications

Type of Fraud

In 2017, P&G and Chase suspended their digital ad budget of $200 million dollars and reduced their ad shares from 400,000 to 5,000 in an attempt to reduce their exposure to ad fraud.

Formats

Online advertising fraud is a leading concern amongst almost 50% of mobile marketers according to a report from iotec. Ad Fraud vendor reports 7 different types of mobile ad fraud across 2 different categories:
CategoryDescriptionTypes
Attribution FraudAttribution fraud is when a real user downloads an app and a fraudster attempts to claim attribution for that install. Attribution fraud sees the advertiser pay for a user it attracted through other channels.Types of attribution fraud:
Install fraudInstall fraud is when app installs are not from genuine app users. These installs may be from bots or from people that are not its intended users. These installs don't deliver return on ad spend.Types of install fraud:
  • App Install Farms
  • SDK Spoofing
  • Evasion Techniques

    • Non-profit activity

    In 2016 there were four notable non-profit organizations focused on creating awareness and availability of resources for countering ad fraud; Botlab, JiCWEBS, Media Rating Council, and . Each have published various guidelines and commentaries on ad fraud, most notable of which is the Media Rating Council's Invalid Traffic Detection Guidelines.