Okay,so it's time to clamp down on click fraud: it's spawned an estimated $1 billion industry and its own vocabulary.
According to BusinessWeek Online, botnets are groups of computers that are infected with malicious software that enables the bot operators, also known as bot herders, to send spam, steal financial information or commit click fraud. "Over 3 million computers on the Net today are believed to be part of a 
botnet, with 200,000 new machines being added each month..." says BusinessWeek. The clicks from these networks are often indistinguishable from human clicks---which means online marketers end up paying for them. How do they get control of your computer? One company allegedly provides free software promising to clean spyware from your machine, but it's really a browser hijacker that tracks your searches and generates pop up ads to sell more bogus software or generate clicks. In at least one recent instance, a search engine indirectly abetted the spread of fraudulent activity by 'recycling' ads.
Other ways of generating fraudulent clicks includes clickbot software, and parked websites with little or no content on them except recycled ad placements from Google, Yahoo and others, that exist simply to generate revenue through false clicks.
Whether the problem has actually worsened recently is hard to tell but there does seem to be a growing awareness of the cost to advertisers and an increased outcry to do something about it. It's a daunting task. One problem is developing a concise definition of click fraud, a task currently being undertaken by The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) and Media Rating Council (MRC), along with Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, Ask.com, LookSmart and other IAB members. Another is understanding the true extent of fraudulent clicks, a problem that's being studied by company ClickForensics, agencies and advertisers. Some feel that search engines downplay the problem, and others feel that agencies and advertisers are too removed from the problem to understand when fraudulent activity is occurring.
Caveat emptor, indeed.
Comments