Google says Click Fraud costs them $1 billion/yr

[yys]

I figured some of you might be interested in this.

I don't care what they say, they miss more then a tiny percentage of the click fraud. I know I've been hammered by some of the sites in their 'content network' before. I wonder how much their advertisers have lost over the last year to click fraud.

Give me the timeline if I somehow missed this

http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=4577

March 1st, 2007
Google: Click fraud costs us $1 billion a year
Posted by Larry Dignan @ 4:29 am Categories: General, Web Technology, Google, Search

Google today unveiled more details about the percentage of click fraud on its network and what it plans to do to combat it.

Overall, Google said on its Adwords blog that invalid clicks represent less than 10 percent of all clicks. However, that percentage can add up.

"At Google?s current revenue rate, every percentage point of invalid clicks we throw out represents over $100 million/year in potential revenue foregone," said Google. Add it up and Google forgoes roughly $1 billion in revenue due to click fraud.

In its blog, Google argues that its real time click fraud filters catch most abuses as a way to optimize ROI on ads. That means complaints from advertisers about click fraud are "misunderstandings" in many cases.

"In most cases where malicious activity is found, the clicks have already been filtered out (and not charged for) by our real-time filters. Because of the broad operation of our proactive detection, the relatively rare cases we find of advertisers being affected by undetected click fraud constitute less than 0.02% of all clicks."

Danny Sullivan raises an interesting question about the timing of the disclosure about click fraud: Why now? Transparency is commendable, but I'd guess that there was a little prodding involved. After all, Sullivan notes folks have wanted this data for a while.

So what's Google going to do to prevent click fraud?

It has a three-stage system to detect invalid clicks. "At a high level, we have a three stage-system for invalid click detection: (1) our real-time filters, (2) offline analysis, and (3) reactive investigations."

Google is also going to give advertisers more tools to monitor click fraud.

In the end, Google's message in the blog is clear. Trust us. We're filtering things in real time and are on top of the issue. Google's blog isn't the last word on the issue, but it is a good first step.

Here's the link to Google's blog post

[ADL Colin]

If it's really click fraud how is that a loss? It wouldn't have been there anyway.

[yys]

Originally Posted by ADL Colin

If it's really click fraud how is that a loss? It wouldn't have been there anyway.

I didn't get that either but hey I'm just one of those small advertisers they've had a minor "misunderstanding" with.

[JD]

Originally Posted by ADL Colin

If it's really click fraud how is that a loss? It wouldn't have been there anyway.

refunds and payouts to affiliates that went unnoticed I'm guessing

[RyuLion]

Shit this sucks balls!

[rowan]

Originally Posted by ADL Colin

If it's really click fraud how is that a loss? It wouldn't have been there anyway.

I agree, seems it's a little like complaining your TGP dropped from 100k to 10k after a trade stopped hitbotting you...

I'd be more interested in how much click fraud costs the advertisers. 0.02% is probably based on what they acknowledge (after a fight?) and credit.

[fris]

http://www.clickingagent.com/softcaca.html

^^

reason why they lose so much

[pocketkangaroo]

Google is beyond full of shit. There is so much more click fraud out there. We turn in reports weekly that usually has the fraud at 30% of clicks we receive in some areas.

[vvq]

that whole model is a bust. it's a scammers paradise.