Click Fraud and Click ForensicsClick fraud is getting more and more sophisticated, and as ever it is the advertisers that are hit hardest by this crime. The advertisers are finally starting to do something about it. Many major players in the advertising industry are working together to try to find progressive solutions to click fraud, working under the name of Click Forensics. The Need For An Industry Standard The problem with trusting the advertising networks to work to implement solutions to click fraud is that these networks will often benefit from the crime themselves. No-one is accusing Google of actively encouraging click fraud, but most advertisers believe that they are not doing everything they can to solve the problem. Since Google and other advertising networks like them have a vested interest in click fraud continuing, it is the advertisers who have the incentive to fight the fraudsters. If advertisers really want to take on the challenge of fighting against click fraud, they need to show a united front, and in the past this hasn't happened. The industry needs a generally accepted definition of click fraud, a generally accepted method of presenting data for visitor behavior, and analyzing it for potential suspicious clicks and invalid clicks, but most of all the industry needs a generally accepted organization, to be the front of the fight against click fraud. Click Forensics Click forensics is the closest thing that we currently have to an authority on click fraud. They created the Click Fraud Index in 2006, an information resource about industry click fraud rates. Statistics are published quarterly for specific trends, industries and search providers. This allows advertisers, and indeed anyone in the advertising industry, the opportunity to get relevant, reliable and up to date information about click fraud across the internet. Click Forensics and the Search Engines The search engines have often had major disagreements with Click Forensics, especially on the topic of the numbers that Click Forensics publishes. It was created because the search engines are not independent and have a vested interest in click fraud continuing, but the search engines argue that Click Forensics has a vested interest in portraying click fraud as a bigger problem than it actually is. The search engines also say that the majority of the click fraud shown in the numbers is automatically dealt with, and the clicks are automatically invalidated. They are not arguing over peanuts - Click Forensics has claimed that potentially nearly 20% of clicks are invalid for some reason, and Google have claimed that the percentage of invalid clicks charged to the advertiser is in the region of 0.02%. More recently, discontent among advertisers has pressured the search engines into co-operating more fully, and in 2008 Yahoo and then Google agreed to take on board information that Click Forensics was giving them about possible invalid clicks from various sources. Click Forensics also complies click quality reports, and Google have agreed to accept this information automatically, rather than forcing end users to manually submit information. |
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| AdWatcher | 9.3 |
| HitsLink | 6.4 |
| HyperTracker | 6.4 |
| WhosClickingWho | 6.4 |
| DynaTracker | 6.2 |
| ConversionRuler | 6.3 |
| AdTrackz | 5.9 |
| AdMinder | 5.1 |
| ROIWiz | 5 |
| ClickAlyzer | 1.6 |
| ProAnalyzer | 0 |
