Click-fraud, the act of clicking on a site’s ads simply to trigger revenue for the site is a growing problem.

There are a number of companies that provide advertising services in order to help sites generate revenue. Most of the sites that the general public visits on a regular basis are sustained only by ad revenue — yes, even this one. Google, Yahoo, and Chitika are a few of the biggest names in the business, and they do what they can to fight click-fraud. Though despite their efforts, pay-per-click fraud is on the rise according to Media Post.

In the fourth-qurater of 2006, the average click-fraud rate was measured at 14.2% for the entire industry and 19.2% for companies who also manage search engines such as Google’s AdSense. In the fourth-quarter of 2007, the average rate rose to 16.6% for the entire industry and 28.3% for search-engine networks.

Freakonomics did some math on the issue, coming to the conclusion that if Media Post’s numbers, which come from the Click Fraud Index, are correct, about 26 million web publishers are currently committing fraud. Ad-networks see this as a major problem and deal with it accordingly.

For example, Google has developed a number of methods to fight click-fraud. Googiewoogie reports that the company uses its own home-cooked software to monitor click-fraud. Specific information of every ad-click is recorded such as the IP of the click-source, the time the ad was clicked, and any potential click patterns. Google also has a team dedicated to examining individual cases of click-fraud.

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Entry was posted on Friday, February 22nd, 2008 at 6:25 pm under Advertising, Google, Internet, Scams, Technology, Web2.0.

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