This week's review of ad fraud and quality in the digital advertising space.
The Wall Street Journal has reported that "Google is issuing refunds for ads that ran on websites with fake traffic." The article adds, "In the past few weeks, the Alphabet Inc. unit has informed hundreds of marketers and ad agency partners about the issue with invalid traffic, known in the industry as 'ad fraud.' The ads were bought using the company’s DoubleClick Bid Manager over the course of a few months this year, primarily in the second quarter."
Providence Equity, a private equity firm, has bought the majority of DoubleVerify for $200 million, reported the Wall Street Journal. The investment values DoubleVerify at $300 million. "As advertisers boost their digital ad budgets to reach consumers online, they’re increasingly looking for verification that their ads are seen and clicked on by real people, versus so-called bots that mimic human behavior, and that they appear in or near media content deemed safe and appropriate," wrote the WSJ.
"Although the Video Player Ad-Serving Interface (VPAID) was meant to create better measurement in online video, it’s not that compatible with mobile video or OTT," wrote AdExchanger. Learn more about the challenges.
In a guest post on The Drum, Nigel Gilbert, VP, Strategic Development, EMEA, AppNexus, wrote, "The good news is the world of programmatic is moving towards a more efficient and transparent model. Viewability will become the default currency, where marketers only pay for viewable impressions. Marketers like P&G are already demanding viewable, fraud-free, effective digital advertising."
According to Fossbytes, citing research from Kaspersky Labs, a new adware/malware attack is happening via Facebook Messenger. "The malware fools people into clicking on malicious links and attempts to download adware," wrote Fossbytes. "This campaign is targeting Windows, macOS, and Linux users."
Sign up for our blog to stay updated with new stats, trends, and analysis on digital ad fraud.
