click fraud
Bogus ad engagement
Click fraud is the practice of artificially inflating click counts on online advertisements, either to drain a competitor's advertising budget or to generate fraudulent revenue from pay-per-click programs.
It can be done manually or through automated bots: The company sued its rival for click fraud after noticing suspicious traffic patterns.
financial
Decline in income
- overbillingCharging beyond what's owed
- chargebackForced transaction reversal
legal
Illegal digital conduct
- litigationLegal dispute process
- class actionLawsuit filed for many
- criminal prosecutionGovernment's legal action against accused
- complianceAdhering to requirements
perpetrators
People who deceive for gain
- competitorsThose seeking same goal
- publishersFirms producing printed works
- affiliatesConnected member organizations
- cybercriminalsOnline law breakers
detection
Metadata pattern study
- pattern recognitionIdentifying regularities in inputs
- suspicious activityBehavior suggesting wrongdoing
- behavioral analysisStudy of conduct patterns
- machine learningAlgorithms that improve from data
botnet
Remotely controlled infected computers
- cloakingAct of hiding something
revenue loss
Decline in income
- overbillingCharging beyond what's owed
- chargebackForced transaction reversal
cybercrime
Illegal digital conduct
- litigationLegal dispute process
- class actionLawsuit filed for many
- criminal prosecutionGovernment's legal action against accused
compliance · digital forensics · evidence collection · cease and desist
fraudsters
People who deceive for gain
- competitorsThose seeking same goal
- publishersFirms producing printed works
- affiliatesConnected member organizations
traffic analysis
Metadata pattern study
- pattern recognitionIdentifying regularities in inputs
- suspicious activityBehavior suggesting wrongdoing
- behavioral analysisStudy of conduct patterns
- fraudscam, swindle, con, deceive, cheat
- cyber threatsmalware, phishing, hacking, virus, ransomware
- cybercrimeshacking, phishing, malware, ransomware, data breach
- ad rulesad disclosure, false advertising, ad ban, deceptive ads, misleading labels
- online fraudfake followers, bots, botnets, fake profiles, fake reviews
- paid searchPPC, Google Ads, ad auction, keywords, bidding
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