What is Google doing to combat click fraud?
With such a large part of the advertising pie being grabbed, what are the advertising behemoths like Google doing to combat click fraud? After all, if the money was being taken from them, they'd have it secured very soon.
If you're spending money on Google Ads, you're certainly curious about what Google is doing to protect its clients against click and ad fraud.
What exactly is click fraud?
For the uninitiated, click fraud occurs when you obtain clicks on your sponsored links from people who have no intention of purchasing your goods. Click fraud, which is sometimes done maliciously, might include rivals attempting to deplete your online advertising budget or organized crooks profiting from counterfeit websites.
In this comprehensive guide, you can learn all there is to know about click and ad fraud.
Google refers to any non-genuine clicks on sponsored advertising as 'invalid clicks,' which might range from a real mistake to a well-organized click farm clicking on your ads.
It is believed that click fraud affects around 20% of all sponsored links on the internet, ranging from display advertisements or videos to paid search engine page results.
Simply put, if you pay for web traffic, you're probably paying a fair amount for fraud of some form. This covers not only search engine traffic but also other types of sponsored links, like social media. So, what do advertising behemoths like Google do to safeguard your campaigns against click fraud and other fraudulent activity?
Google tracks and prevents click fraud in what ways?
Because advertising income is by far Google's largest source of revenue, it should be in their best interests to maintain trust in the platform. Yes, Google has an entire staff dedicated to detecting and combating click fraud on Google Ads.
However, the marketing sector believes that Google does just enough but could do more. The most common argument is that Google earns money from every click, whether fake or not, and so has no incentive to crack down on fraud.
This fairly sarcastic viewpoint may have gained popularity over the years, but eliminating fake clicks is a herculean effort. Google plays its share, to be sure, but there are flaws in its methods, as we'll show.
Google Adsense website validation
One of the primary reasons Google is such a dominant platform is because it provides ad placement on more than 11 million websites. If you want to advertise your product on a prominent website with high traffic potential, Google Ads is a good option.
With a well-designed banner ad, you can immediately channel the type of traffic that would otherwise take years to create organically. You may also have a worldwide advertising reach, ensuring that your commercials are seen by a diverse range of individuals and assisting in the speedy development of your brand.
The issue is that many websites are designed deliberately to maximize advertising income. Some of them are simply low-quality websites meant to generate views and ad clicks. Others are programmed to display fake advertisements, frequently using counterfeit domains and complex methods to maximize impressions—a technique known as ad fraud.
These faked sites are merely constructed to host display advertising and collect the reward from clicks channeled via them, which are mostly bots or click farms. In reality, human eyes may seldom view the content, let alone the advertisements, on many of these spoof sites.
So, what is Google going to do about it?
When a site is submitted to AdSense, Google carefully verifies its quality before allowing it to display banner advertising. In reality, submitting your site to Adsense is not difficult. You simply need to provide a website that looks half acceptable and is designed for human use, with enough material on it.
All sites submitted to Google's AdSense program are manually reviewed by people to ensure that they load quickly, are legible with human eyes, and are otherwise functioning. In short, Google needs to verify that your website is live and functional.
However, one of the main objections is that an unethical webmaster may easily develop a website that resembles this one. In fact, according to one study, a marketer who examined over 48,000 AdSense sites determined that 90% of them were phony.
Advertising.txt, a recent industry-wide project, attempted to address this issue by allowing marketers to define who sees their advertising. Although useful in certain aspects, ads.txt has introduced additional issues, which you can read about here.
Terms violations
Google explicitly states that it will not tolerate fraud when you submit your AdSense site for verification. The fraud detection process is ongoing, and if your site generates an unusually high number of fake clicks, publishers may be banned or even denied.
Of course, a single fake click does not qualify a website publisher as a fraudster. There are several methods for sites to be vulnerable to PPC fraud; therefore, if a complaint is filed against the webmaster, they are given the opportunity to correct the situation.
Hosting display ads is an honest way for many websites to monetize their material. This is how most blogs and online periodicals get their money, so just because you haven't heard of a site doesn't mean it's fraudulent.
Keep an eye on the sites from which you obtain clicks during your PPC advertising campaigns and report any that appear questionable.
Algorithms for preventing accidental clicks on PPC advertising
To Google's credit, they do have some excellent algorithms in place to reduce inadvertent 'invalid' clicks. Assume you're viewing a website on your phone and unintentionally click on an ad that opens a new page. You immediately shut down this page and continue reading the stuff you intended to...
Meanwhile, Google's algorithms have already identified that inadvertent click as invalid, and the advertiser has not had to pay for it.
The fact that the bounce rate was exceptionally high indicates that the user left the site before it even loaded or within seconds of it loading. This is typical of accidental clicks and is reasonably simple to address for Google (and other advertising networks).
Google Play Security
Mobile apps or app viruses are one of the new areas for ad fraud. The DrainerBot infection, for example, spread across hundreds of apps and millions of downloads owing to some shaky coding in a software kit.
Google Play Protect, which analyzes applications for suspicious code and malware, was developed to help eradicate this type of spyware. It also warns users about the possibility of security flaws in app downloads and aims to fix gaps by pushing developers to design software that is compatible with newer, more secure versions of Android.
In 2019, Play Protect technology blocked over 1.9 billion virus downloads. Despite the fact that this program is a great concept and has helped to reduce malware on the Android platform, the problem is constantly developing. Malware is frequently incorporated into applications after they have been downloaded, either through an update (known as a dropper) or by side loading,' which occurs when an app is downloaded from a source other than the app store.
Simply put, malware is an issue that will not go away. Google is always fighting the battle, but every time one battle is won, a new threat emerges.
Filters, both automated and human, are used to prevent fraud.
With the ability to draw on the world's crème de la crème of technology expertise, you'd think Google would have some robust safeguards against click fraud. They do, in fact. They presently have over 180 sophisticated data filters that are regularly updated. They also have a specialized crew that is on the lookout for botnet activity and will carefully examine questionable PPC ad activity.
But it doesn't mean you should relax and think they've got everything covered. If you use Google Ads to market your business, you should still monitor ad behavior, such as suspicious IP addresses, strange publisher sites, and spikes in click activity.
If you notice anything strange that you believe requires attention, submit it to Google and follow their advice to reduce your exposure to click fraud and ad fraud.
Is Google going above and beyond?
Looking at Google advertising traffic quality sites, it is clear that Google is doing all possible to avoid incorrect clicks on your sponsored advertising. They have whole development teams dedicated to detecting fraud and upgrading software. However, according to our research, click fraud is quite consistent even with these safeguards in place.
Every month, CHEQ Essentials screens out millions of bot clicks and other strange activities.
So it's difficult to say if Google is doing enough. They may handle things differently, or they may do enough to prevent the most obvious types of erroneous clicks, such as accidental clicks.
With an estimated 90% (not our estimate) of AdSense sites being faked, there looks to be plenty of room for improvement. The issue is that Google gets a lot of money from ad clicks, even if the advertising is on fake sites. And, until there is a dramatic change in the manner in which sites are approved, this appears to be the case.
Yes, the Play Protect and ads.txt controls that were implemented have aided in some ways. However, as previously said, fraudsters are ingenious and will always discover another way in.
There will be more updates soon.
You may already be aware that Google is working on some significant upgrades. One of the most significant is that Google will no longer use third-party cookies in Chrome. The argument behind this is that it allows internet users greater privacy, with tailored advertising based on individual behavior and a shift to 'cohorts' or groupings of individuals who are similar.
Google also intends to modify the way it monitors and filters click fraud. It remains to be seen how effective this will be. One of the biggest issues with any of these large adjustments, however, is that fraudsters nearly always find a way around them.
As we've seen, ads.txt did not prevent ad fraud and, in some ways, spawned a new type of PPC fraud. Play Protect, too, has just changed the method by which app fraud occurs and has had little effect on the number of fraudulent clicks. Even while Google works hard to combat click fraud, it appears that there is always another issue that surfaces.
What role does third-party click fraud software play?
Although restricting the sites where your ad appears might be beneficial, it is not the best answer for everyone. After all, whether you're starting a new business or launching a new product, you'll probably want your ad to show up on as many different websites as possible. And the fact is that determining which sites are spoofed and which are not is really tough.
Click fraud prevention software, such as CHEQ Essentials, works differently from Google. We can identify numerous clicks from the same source by issuing a unique ID to each device that clicks on a PPC ad, even if they use VPNs or other ways to alter IP addresses.
Third-party software also prevents click fraud on your PPC advertisements by blacklisting suspicious IP addresses and automating ad blocking for suspect IPs and devices.
This allows you to freely show Google Ads, but by utilizing anti-click fraud software, you can stop fraudulent clicks and other questionable activities.
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