Overall click fraud rose quarter-over-quarter and year-over-year in Q1 2010, according to [pdf] a recent study from online ad verification provider ClickForensics.
The ClickForensics Click Fraud Index shows that the overall rate of click fraud of online pay-per-click advertisements in Q1 2010 was 17.4%, MarketingCharts reports. This represents an increase from both 15.3% in Q4 2009 and 13.8% in Q1 2009. The proportion of click fraud attributed to botnets and malware has grown each quarter for the past three years and now accounts for almost half of all invalid clicks.
Q1 Increase Reverses Recent Trends
This sequential increase continues a trend observed in the Click Fraud Index during the past two quarters, but ClickForensics says it is somewhat surprising because the fourth quarter of each calendar year normally shows a seasonal uptick in click fraud, while the first quarter typically demonstrates a regression to the mean.
The annual first quarter data also shows a long-term trend toward increased fraud, with 2009 being the single exception. Since the rate was first reported in 2006 there has been an annual increase in every year except 2009.
Fraud Sophistication Contributes to Increase
ClickForensics says one possible explanation for the increase in the overall click fraud rate for Q1 2010 could be the increase in sophisticated forms of fraud identified. For example, ClickForensics detects and reports data for more than 15 different invalid click types. These invalid click types range from simple repeat clicks (invalid, but not fraudulent) to anomalies in volume or distribution.
One of the most sophisticated click fraud types is found as part of a scheme called publisher collusion, discovered through pattern recognition and advanced cluster analysis of click sources. In a publisher collusion scheme, fraudsters attempt to mimic valid traffic patterns by spreading botnets or malware across a wide range of computers which then click on ads in a seemingly random pattern. Being distributed across many IP-addresses, the fraudulent clicks are less easily detected and identified as invalid.
However, advanced collusion detection mechanisms are able to identify and filter out these invalid clicks. In Q1 2010, ClickForensics identified a greater percentage of collusion fraud which contributed to the rise.
Social Media Has Lower Click Fraud Rate
In Q1 2010, ClickForensics observed an increase in traffic from social media sites across the community of advertisers and ad networks it monitors.
The overall invalid rate measured on social media sites in Q1 of 2010 was 11.5%, significantly lower than the overall industry click fraud rate of 17.4%. Click Forensics analysis suggests that lower motivation for click fraud within closed social networks, user credential requirements of most social networks, and botnet/spider filtering all reduced the incidence of click fraud on social media sites.
About the Data: The data used in this analysis was gathered from third-party ad networks and directly from advertisers, not from any social media sites. Click-through traffic contains the domain names of the various social sites in the referrer field. Actual observed invalid rate for any individual social site could vary significantly. Some sites, like Twitter, do not accept ads directly from advertisers or ad networks
