Click fraud declines and still does not diminish

According to Click Forensics data, the practice of generating counterfeit charges to pay-per-click advertisers by imitating the clicks of real users, known as click fraud, reflected considerable decline in the first half of 2009. 

After two years of worldwide rates hovering steadily around or above 15%, Click Forensics reported a decrease to 13.8% in the first quarter of 2009 and a further decline to just 12.7% the second quarter.

Click Forensics refers the decline to improved efforts by advertising networks to identify and block the sources of fraudulent clicks.

In spite of an overall fraud decrease, problems from “sophisticated sources and scripted programs” rose in the second quarter.

Anchor Intelligence reported much higher worldwide click fraud rates for the first and second quarter of 2009, at 21.7% and 22.9%, respectively. Steve O’Brien, VP of marketing for Click Forensics stated that the total cost of click fraud in 2008 may have occurred as high as $4.35 billion if none of the fraud was disclosed.