Re: False Clicks/Click Fraud

From: Brad Jensen <brad.jensen_at_laservault.com>
Date: Mon 14 Aug 2006 16:58:41 -0500

The examples you posted don't seem to have anything to do
with Google AdSense.

I think Google can tell when a link is followed by a search
bot rather than a web browser, for any legtimate search bot
that reports itself as something other than a stanard web
browser. They can also analyze the ip address of the agent
(human or otherwise) doing the clicking.

I'm an AdWords user and recently set up an AdSense-using site
(www.n2information.com). Without thinking, after setting up
the site, I was browsing it myself and clicked ONE ad -
something I was actually interested in. With 24 hours I had an
email from the Google adsense support team telling me that an
invalid click had registered on my site, and warning me
against clicking ads on my own site. I've got 12,000 pages on
the site with AdSense ads on each. Google noticed, and
informed me of, one click on on page out of 12,000. I would
say they are pretty serious about watching for and preventing
click fraud.

I assured them that, no I was not intending to jeopardize my
AdSense publisher status. I also made some suggestions for
programmatically avoiding click fraud and unintential invlaid
clicks.

I assume they matched my ip to an ip used to log in to my
Adsense account statistics. (They didn't say how they matched
me up.)

It would not surprise me if they are watching for repeated
clicks form the same ips or ip ranges, alos. It is easy to
watch for.

I think the concerns of click fraud, at least with AdSense,
are way overblown.

Brad Jensen
www.n2information.com
www.free-adsense-secrets.com





Received on Mon Aug 14 2006 - 16:58:41 CDT