Easy Way For Google To Prevent Click Fraud? [discuss]

Why not simply register only the first click per day, per IP on each advert? Then if I clicked a competitor's ad 1,000 times from my PC they would only pay for one. Surely this would be an easy piece of code to implement and would at least make click fraud more time-consuming.

 

Except I have legitimately clicked on an ad more then once (especially when comparing prices or service etc)

Also, how you handle when legitimately different people are on the same IP (Which is extremely common)?

 

The ad would be paid for only once? You would still transfered. I agree with your point and it could be really bad on a Uni campus but there are so many people who freely admit to triple-clicking opponent's ads that something has to be done.

 

So the advertiser wouldn't be charged either?

This woulld cost Publishers millions and Google itself hundreds of millions.

I do agree it sounds like an easy fix but the real challenge is sorting the legitimate clicks from the same ip from those you referenced to as "so many people who freely admit to triple-clicking opponent's ads"

You obviously limit the damage by only applying this to Search rather then content but Google still loses major revenue.

 

The question is would it cost publishers/Google anywhere near as much as click fraud currently costs advertisers?

 

Well, recent articles have quoted Google as saying that click fraud is way overstated, that it is nowhere near the numbers reported so I think we pretty much have Googles opinion on the matter.

Also, according to their financial releases AdWords advertisers are stilll on the up so the amount of click fraud that is present doesn't seem to deter them.

 

That idea sounds like free advertising to me. Buy 1 get 10!

 

Hi

There are good many click fraud arresting tools. Have you tried any?

Prasaad

 

10 from the same person... you could get the same if the person realised how to 'add bookmark' or 'write URL down'.

And Google is hardly going to say Click Fraud is rampant, is it? ''Yes, howabouts we scare off all possible advertisers?''

 

However, the flaw is "Same IP doesn't equal Same Person"

 

This is true. It doesn't work in all fairness because of things like Universities, shared T1 lines, etc. However, surely you could set a cookie when a MACHINE clicks an ad so that machine can't register a click for it again?

 

Cookies can be blocked.

Whatever you think of, Google has tought of it 3 years ago. They employ the cleverest nerds and chuck billions in R&D towards it. I'd be amazed if you can outsmart them.