Click Fraud Grows
Click Forensics, Inc. recently released its Click Fraud Index for the fourth quarter of 2007. Click fraud for the pay-per-click industry reached 16.6% during the last quarter of last year, the highest rate observed since the index was launched at the end of 2006. This figure was 14.2% in the same quarter of 2006, and 16.2% during the third quarter of 2007.
The average click fraud rate of pay-per-click ads showing up on search engine content networks was 28.3% in the fourth quarter of 2007. These networks include Google AdSense and the Yahoo Publisher Network. In the last quarter of 2006 this number was 19.2%. The click fraud rate for these networks was 28.1% in the third quarter of 2007.
Click fraud traffic from botnets in the fourth quarter of 2007 was 15% higher than the traffic in the prior quarter.
India (4.3%), Germany (3.9%), and South Korea (3.7%) all generated the most click fraud traffic outside of North America.
Sources:
http://www.internetretailer.com/dailyNews.asp?id=25254
http://publications.mediapost.com/index.cfm?
fuseaction=Articles.showArticle&art_aid=76700
http://www.bizreport.com/2008/02/click_forensics_click_fraud_up_16.html
