22 March 2007
Click fraud is a major issue for search engines. It happens when either a person or an automated machine repeatedly clicks on an advertiser's paid search advert, with no interest in what lies at the other end of it. This is a problem for advertisers, as they pay for the click but will never get a return on the cost incurred.
Mr Davis has much experience in the field of click fraud; he was the associate general counsel for Yahoo! in the class action suit filed against Yahoo! by the Checkmate Strategic Group in June 2006, which led to Yahoo! having to make significant changes in its click fraud prevention methods.
In a statement, Mr Davis said that he had received a mandate to increase advertiser confidence when advertising on Yahoo!, stating that "the goal is to develop the highest quality network in reality and in perception".
Mr Davis' appointment is a good way for Yahoo! to show how critically they are taking this issue of click fraud, and to show that they are tackling the problem effectively. Last year, Google were the first search engine to address advertisers' issues with click fraud. Measures included providing new reports that show how many invalid clicks have been rejected by the engine, increasing transparency in the methods that they use to combat click fraud.
Search engines look at the patterns of clicks received on adverts, taking into account issues like suspicious patterns in the timings of the clicks or multiple clicks from the same IP address, to find possible click fraudsters. Search engines then proactively seek out instances of click fraud, and remove the clicks from the advertisers' invoice.
In his statement, Davis said that the number of clicks that Yahoo proactively removes from billing is around 12-15 per cent of the total number of clicks, while the actual number of fraudulent clicks is lower than this. This means that advertisers should not be experiencing loss due to click fraud, as the engines are overcompensating for the number of fraudulent clicks.
The measures that the world's leading search engines are taking to combat click fraud show how seriously they are taking the issue. Even if the actual numbers of fraudulent clicks are fairly small, click fraud remains a worry for advertisers and undermines confidence in the use of paid search advertising - good luck to Mr Davis in tackling this tricky problem!
Yahoo! appoints click fraud chief
Yahoo!, the world's second favourite search engine, has made an important internal promotion. Mr Reggie Davis has moved from a position as a Yahoo! staff lawyer to an executive position as the Vice President of Marketplace Quality - or alternatively, Yahoo!'s "Click Fraud Tsar".Click fraud is a major issue for search engines. It happens when either a person or an automated machine repeatedly clicks on an advertiser's paid search advert, with no interest in what lies at the other end of it. This is a problem for advertisers, as they pay for the click but will never get a return on the cost incurred.
Mr Davis has much experience in the field of click fraud; he was the associate general counsel for Yahoo! in the class action suit filed against Yahoo! by the Checkmate Strategic Group in June 2006, which led to Yahoo! having to make significant changes in its click fraud prevention methods.
In a statement, Mr Davis said that he had received a mandate to increase advertiser confidence when advertising on Yahoo!, stating that "the goal is to develop the highest quality network in reality and in perception".
Mr Davis' appointment is a good way for Yahoo! to show how critically they are taking this issue of click fraud, and to show that they are tackling the problem effectively. Last year, Google were the first search engine to address advertisers' issues with click fraud. Measures included providing new reports that show how many invalid clicks have been rejected by the engine, increasing transparency in the methods that they use to combat click fraud.
Search engines look at the patterns of clicks received on adverts, taking into account issues like suspicious patterns in the timings of the clicks or multiple clicks from the same IP address, to find possible click fraudsters. Search engines then proactively seek out instances of click fraud, and remove the clicks from the advertisers' invoice.
In his statement, Davis said that the number of clicks that Yahoo proactively removes from billing is around 12-15 per cent of the total number of clicks, while the actual number of fraudulent clicks is lower than this. This means that advertisers should not be experiencing loss due to click fraud, as the engines are overcompensating for the number of fraudulent clicks.
The measures that the world's leading search engines are taking to combat click fraud show how seriously they are taking the issue. Even if the actual numbers of fraudulent clicks are fairly small, click fraud remains a worry for advertisers and undermines confidence in the use of paid search advertising - good luck to Mr Davis in tackling this tricky problem!
English
German/Deutsch
Norwegian/Norsk
Swedish/Svenska
Italian/Italiano
French/Français
Spanish/Español
Latest News
Group sues over Google privacy policy changes
Google pays users to give up their privacy
Yahoo Chairman Roy Bostock steps down
Google introduces Chrome for Android
Apple warns appayola-using app-makers
Deleted photos live on in Facebook servers
Ofcom caps broadband and phone line prices
RSS News Feeds
Related Articles
