Preventing Click Attack or Fraud on your Adsense account

June 29, 2007

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Many publishers in Google adsense are worried about this issue and receiving the nasty email about “Invalid Clicks”. Here are some tips/discussion about it:

2 Years ago, I had the same problem with Google Adsense, in one of our (family) site that talks about scammers and my husband posted about a scammer and his company. After 2 days received like 120 clicks and he immediately send an email to adsense about this issue, no answers from them after 3 days his account has banned. That was not a nice move from Google Adsense. Anyways, members are worried about this issue and YOU HAVE to worry because if you got attacked your chances to get banned from Adsense will be 90%

hi members;
well i want to know what else can be done IYHO regarding Click Fraud Prevention in addition to following options:

How to Prevent Click Attack?

- Minimize the possibilities of Accidental clicks by placing ads at legible positions where they can be identified as ad links in stead of click able content.

- Report Google against abnormal click thru rise.

- For the meanwhile Google takes remedial steps remove ads from attacked websites.

HOW you all deal with Click Fraud? There are some Click Fraud preventive softwares available to fight against click fraud…How effective they are?

Thanks in advance for your kind replies & suggestions…:)

Accidental clicks by your site visitors are not click fraud. All AdSense ads are identified as such by the Ads by Google indicator.

Fortunately, I’ve never had a reason to be concerned about click fraud on my site and I’ve been in the AdSense program since it began four years ago.

Yep you are right it’s not any kind of Google AdSense TOS violation….. but do results in unproductive click thus.

In that way it enhances your chances to get adversely affected either in the form of adsense payout deductions or if the ratio is being high your account can also get banned by google!

Should not be called Click Fraud.. but yes.. it does make google to look at the webmaster with suspicion! Webmaster has chances to get hit by SMART PRicing…

BUT if a webmaster promotes accidental clicks knowingly then it can be treat as a Fraudulent attempt!

I don’t think there is any way thou which a PPC engine can recognize that the clicks are accidental or drawn intentionally….what u know about it?

thanks for your reply

For the most part, I generally do not worry about click fraud. However when I refuse to exchange links with another webmaster (especially other adsense publishers) I do have experience something that resembles fear in the back of my mind

However when I refuse to exchange links with another webmaster

I never reply to link exchange requests. At the same time, I am not refusing them, so have no real concerns on those sites taking it out against me

Scurra

Me too, that’s the one time when I paused for thought. Recently I’ve not advertised link exchanges for two reasons. Reason 1 is the fear of what a refusal might lead to. Reason 2, they don’t work anymore. Links embedded in relevant text yes, links on lnks pages - the search engines have got wise to that.

I agree, link exchanges will probably do more harm than good these days. I haven’t actually accepted a link now for almost a full year. When I decline links I don’t actually reply with a rejection letter, I just let the matter go. Still, there’s no way to know what the subsequent reaction (if any) will be from the other party.

Well Click Fraud has no direct relation with link exchange!

How come Link Exchange can be related to Click Fraud… There is only the possibility of Link Fraud only if you go on linking with Unrelated websites named Link Farms.

Link Exchange = Click Fraud…seems like webmaster’s Click Fraudnoisys ;)… u r seems to be overfrightened!

See webmasters request link exchange to enhance their site’s worth for that they are interested in requesting links from relevant websites which are not among their direct competitors then how cum refusal can promote them to do Click Fraud attempts?

There is just a need to get aware of Link Farms or MFA’s etc while link exchanging…!

See, if direct competitor website owners sends you link request then it is clear that they are not aware of this fact or just sent link request ramdomly assuming that they might get good indirect but yet relevant links… direct competitors will refuse their request directly!

Moreover links are useful to enhance your website quality & worth not only among Search engine bots but among your visitors too! It adds up to your site’s content…the only important thing is that these linking websites must be relevant to your website theme but not among your direct visitors (as they snatch your visitors away)!

And it’s an individual webmaster’s wish that he/she may accept or reject link proposals:)!

No one can get annoyed…it’s very rare situation-you are not the only one who is going to reject their request!

Don’t be so worried about it it’s like 1% chance… & if you notice anykind of quick variation in your click thru or impression stats then consult Google directly about it…

They will tackle it out rightly!

Well Click Fraud has no direct relation with link exchange!

I think what the member is trying to say is that in declining a link exchange he might be creating an enemy. Some people enjoy any pretext or excuse for the opportunity to exact revenge or retribution for whatever offense they can imagine, real or not.

It’s probably a good idea, at the very least for selfish motives, to avoid unpleasantness with people who know the URL to your website. That includes girlfriends, relatives, and acquaintances online and off.

IP exclusion helps tackle the issue of competitor click fraud!

visit this link:
https://adwords.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=61492

Isn’t this tool for ADVERTISERS (i.e. AdWords clients) rather than publishers?

I haven’t spent much time worrying about getting “click attacked.” Of course now that I’ve said that I’ll get whacked back to the stoneage… The possibility is always there, but so is the possibility of getting hit by a truck. How likely is either to happen?

I could probably show a good deal of evidence that it wasn’t me personally who went to my website one day and clicked on an adsense ad 578 times in a seven minute period. I can’t show any evidence that I didn’t orchestrate it though, nor can I show any evidence that it’s not going to happen again. Nobody can. What “worries” me more than being accused of generating click fraud is Google giving me the boot just because it happened. I have no doubt that Google has terminated and continues to terminate accounts for “invalid clicks” simply because it’s more cost effective than trying to determine what actually happened. You got click attacked. You didn’t do it. You show “proof” you didn’t do it. They’ll pat you on your back and send you packing anyway. The fact is it happened. If it happened once, it can happen again. Terminate the account and the argument goes moot. Goes moot.. get it?

Click attack. Click fraud. A click attack is click fraud. Clicking your own ads, or getting others to click them for you, is click fraud as well but typically would leave a different footprint. I think we can stipulate to that. 578 clicks in a seven minute period is a click attack. Kinda hard to miss that one. Click fraud done for the purpose of generating revenue would be more subtle and, presumably, harder to spot. In either event there’s a hidden morals clause that Google doesn’t tell you about and is not widely known. This morals clause rides on a sort of guilt by association thing. The fact that you got click attacked means you might know click attackers. You might even hang out with them. That and the possibility of it happening again.

Now - here’s the part I like - before they boot me out of the program they’re going to give my entire account a manual review. They’re going to look at my website. They’re going to look at my traffic sources and click trends and link partners and all of the other information they have available (which is considerable), including email correspondence and text summaries of phone conversations I’ve had with Google reps. I’m confident they’ll look at all of that. If they don’t, I’ll specifically ask them to. All of those things, not to mention nearly 4 years of trouble free association with the Adsense program, will add weight to whatever my argument happens to be. Will it add enough weight? I don’t know. I do know that worrying about it is pointless. It can happen to anyone.

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