You may have heard of “click fraud”, or perhaps might be aware of the two most common forms of “click fraud” – click injection and click spamming. Although these are both outdated, they still account for over one-third of the total mobile app fraud, according to our recent study: 2019 Q1 Mobile Ad Fraud Report. Although they share a similar name and concept, their detection and prevention methods differ – but don’t fret, that’s for us to worry about. Let’s take a brief look into what is click injection and click spamming – their differences and their similarities.
What is Click Spamming?
Click spamming is the process of sending large numbers of clicks to an MMP. The for chance misattribution (per individual click sent) is very low, therefore, the fraudsters send high volumes of clicks (we’re talking, in the millions), thus, increasing the probability of misattribution and a potential payout.
Click spamming is akin to turning up at the front door of a random stranger and pretending you’re their long-lost relative, hoping they will believe you and invite you in for a free meal. It is unlikely you will be successfully mistaken (misattributed) for the genuine relative, however, if you visit 40 houses every day for a month, you increase your chances of a free feed. Dodgy? Yes. Sophisticated? No. That’s click spamming.
What is Click Injection?
Click injection is another type of ad fraud that follows much of the same patterns of its brute-force brother. The main point of difference is where and when these clicks are sent. These clicks are not sent before the install (like click spamming) rather immediately after the genuine install begins. This aim is for the MMP to see the fraudulent click last (as the fraudulent click is sent after the genuine install has begun) and therefore, mistakenly misattribute the install to the fraudulent click instead.
Let’s use the same scammed meal, as an example – instead, this time you arrive at the precise time dinner is being served. You simply sit down at the dinner table and hope the host accidentally mistakes you for a genuine guest and feeds you instead.
An illustration of the differences between click spamming and click injection. As you can see, these two different types of ad fraud occur at different times throughout the mobile ad journey.
What Does This Mean for You?
Concerning ad fraud – unfortunately, potentially hundreds, maybe hundreds of thousands of dollars. Whatever your mobile ad spend is, select 37% of it and throw it in the rubbish – that is the amount you are paying to fraudulent ad groups due to click spamming and click injection (please see our report: 2019 Q1 Mobile Ad Fraud Report). However, through education, you can make informed choices when evaluating the effectiveness of your ad networks, sub-publishers, MMPs and ultimately, your ad spend.
Our development team studies these differences, patterns, and methods to create, software and sophisticated algorithms to detect and prevent different types of fraud, including click injection and click spamming.
So there you have it, click spamming, click injection and ad fraud – what a wonderful world we live in!
Would you like to have a free fraud consultancy to learn how you can detect and prevent click spamming & click injection? Get started by clicking here.
