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Click Fraud - What is it, Really?

What is click fraud? Well, we know all about the problem for advertisers. Click fraud depletes their advertising dollar, and returns nothing of value.

But there is a corresponding problem of click fraud for publishers - which is not talked about.

A couple of weeks ago, Tracy Coenen wrote about the problem that all of us writing about fraud face: the placement of google ads for fraudulent business opportunities beside the very posts we write about.

"Because my sites often mention MLMs and other business opportunity scams, a lot of the Google ads that show up are offering those very scams!

In the past, I tried to use the competitive ad filter to block these ads.

And that ended up worse than ever.

As fast as I could block certain web addresses, the exact same advertisers were using other web addresses which just forwarded to the original ones I had blocked."

You can see the same thing happen here at the Biz Op News.

Now the real promise of interactive ads was that the placement, by either algorithm or hand, would provide information of real value to readers.

This promise is waning. Crappy or irrelevant links are the norm - especially for any consumer protection site.

But Google is helping out, as Tracy found out. She now uses "Adsense Review Center: "The Ad Review Center seems to be a better option. You can block an entire advertiser's campaign... period."

So I need your help: tell me, with comments or email, which ads added nothing to your experience, were bogus, or otherwise ought to be nuked.

Help me build the biggest blocked ad campaign ever! (Heck, I will even share the blocked sites with anyone who asks)

Thanks for helping.

Full post as published by Misleading Advertising Law on April 08, 2008 (boomark / email).