coming from forbes who are playing 2 videos at once and you don't know which ad you're watching or on which tab it comes from.
Hackers Make $5M a Day by Faking 300M Video Views
61–70 of 136 posts
Re: Hackers Make $5M a Day by Faking 300M Video Views
#62I've long wondered if the best ad blocker would be a client that simply randomly clicks ads instead of blocking them. If you send fake clicks and spoof looking like real activity, that will pressure both advertisers and the websites that display ads. If millions of people do this...
I don't think it would work. Let's say out of every click 20% come from your fake clicker. Advertisers would simply charge 20% less, the net effect would be the same for both advertisers and publishers. Especially on mobile there are already accidental clicks that have that effect.
Re: Hackers Make $5M a Day by Faking 300M Video Views
#63Normally a "real browser" can't run 100s of ad players at once, but "methbrowser" is a node.js application with a C module that speaks Flash's plugin protocol directly. It simulates a dom, runs JavaScript in a node VM, but doesn't have to do any of the messy rendering that things like PhantomJS have to. It was discovered years ago because: * Their IP stack was acting like Linux[1] * Their flash player said "I'm Linux…
Given the complexity and quirks of modern browser engines it seems like it should be pretty easy to detect this type of custom "browser".
Most anti-ad fraud vendors can't do the IP packet analysis trick since they use ELB to help control their costs/scale.
All the other techniques require JavaScript and/or AS3 and are thus subject to modification by these kinds of sophisticated attackers. The only real way to do JavaScript in these cases is to change it often enough and run enough parallel versions that the attacker cannot keep up.
Re: Hackers Make $5M a Day by Faking 300M Video Views
#64Earlier quoted context omitted.
Can we have a spamhaus for ad fraud? * list of botnet infected IPs participating in ad fraud * list of offending/incompetent SSP blindly accepting forged requests
> Can we have a spamhaus for ad fraud? There are a lot of vendors in this space now, offering various kinds of "spamhaus"-type solutions. They're all crap because they operate blacklists of various kinds to keep their customers dependent. The ideal scenario is for ad networks/SSPs to implement the anti-fraud technology themselves, however getting there from here is difficult: The first ad network to go clean will be…
Do you have any more information about the as3 mixer controls?
Re: Hackers Make $5M a Day by Faking 300M Video Views
#65I know some legitimate businesses depend on ads for revenue, but it really has become ridiculous. As a 'normal' internet user, being bombarded and having websites complaining about my ad blocker is starting to piss off quite a bit of people. When I need something, I buy it online most of the time (if possible). I'm kinda happy someone is gaming that whole system against them, maybe it will help transform the ad ecosy…
I'm not sure I can see how this would really help transform the ad ecosystem, even on a sustained basis. The hackers did this enrich themselves at the expense of companies wanting to advertise a product. If the victimized companies were selling low value or dubious products (a value judgement) like magical diet pills, then it might bankrupt a few of them in the short-term.
Maybe those companies who lost money go back and try to sue the ad exchanges because they didn't adequately detect the click fraud, so then it's the ad companies who take the hit.
In the end, what actual change do you think would be enacted by companies who wish to advertise their products being the victim of fraud?
Re: Hackers Make $5M a Day by Faking 300M Video Views
#66Can anyone explain why it's the ad buyers that lose out in this case, not the ad network? Surely it makes way more sense for the ad networks to bare the financial responsibility of preventing ad fraud and not the ad buyer? (The ad equivalent of a money-back-guarantee) How is an ad buyer ever supposed to make an informed decision about how susceptible their chosen ad vendor is to fraud?
At this point, advertisers just assume some level of fraud is part of the deal with any platform. As long as you're hitting your target ROI than advertising on still makes sense.
The world can be divided up into two types of advertising. DR (Direct Response) or Branding/Awareness.
The goal of DR is drive an immediate action, for ex. a purchase or news letter signup. Branding/Awareness is more about keeping the brand/product top of mind for the eventual time when the purchasing is actually done.
Usually small and mid-sized advertisers focus on DR. That's why you see a lot of re-targeting type ads for buying products you abandoned in your shopping cart (exception: large ecommerce).
Then you have large advertisers like the Fortune 500 and beyond. They know that you're not making the purchase right there. Hardly any toothpaste, car, $25k server ads or retirement account ads lead to a conversion instantaneously. This is Branding/Product advertising. The hope is to keep their product top-of-mind so you'll consider it when you're driving by the dealership or in the toothpaste isle at Target. This is like your traditional newspaper advertising. Traditional KPIs like CPA used in DR ads don't make sense here. And, due to fraud CPC and CTR are not that useful.
A lot of brand/product advertisements don't have a good instantaneous KPI and measuring long term ROI for a year long $25k server campaign is nebulous art at best.
So to wrap up this story. The guys running this fraud operation were spoofing "premium" video sites with $13.00+ average CPMs (this is high); they were going for the most expensive inventory. The people buying ads on "premium" video sites are not DR advertisers. The goal was to capture Branding/Product advertisers dollars.
It's a bit of a misconception that all online advertising is ROI focused. This was true maybe 4 years ago. With younger audiences (40 and under) consuming more video content online versus linear television there's been in a influx of branding dollars coming "premium" online video.
(Disclosure: My company Adfin provided data for financial estimate for this anti-fraud operation done by WhiteOps)
Re: Hackers Make $5M a Day by Faking 300M Video Views
#67I've long wondered if the best ad blocker would be a client that simply randomly clicks ads instead of blocking them. If you send fake clicks and spoof looking like real activity, that will pressure both advertisers and the websites that display ads. If millions of people do this...
I get a cheap thrill out of clicking ads to make people pay. Trump ad ... click Comcast ... click Ambulance chasing lawyer ... click click click So that would be better than random - a plugin that clicks the ads for things you don't like or aren't interested in.
It would be extremely hilarious if when google detects you're doing that, it locks you out of all of your google accounts.
Re: Hackers Make $5M a Day by Faking 300M Video Views
#68And they say crime doesn't pay
Re: Hackers Make $5M a Day by Faking 300M Video Views
#69Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Can we have a spamhaus for ad fraud? There are a lot of vendors in this space now, offering various kinds of "spamhaus"-type solutions. They're all crap because they operate blacklists of various kinds to keep their customers dependent. The ideal scenario is for ad networks/SSPs to implement the anti-fraud technology themselves, however getting there from here is difficult: The first ad network to go clean will be…
Do you have any more information about the as3 mixer controls?
Sure.
var st:SoundTransform = new SoundTransform(1.0);
st.leftToLeft = st.leftToRight = 0.0;
st.rightToLeft = st.rightToRight = 0.0;
SoundMixer.soundTransform = st;
SoundMixer.soundTransform.volume
Re: Hackers Make $5M a Day by Faking 300M Video Views
#70> bots "watched" as many as 300 million video ads a day, with an average of $13.04 per faked view How were they getting $13.04 per view ?
Article was corrected an hour or two ago.
"The article has since been updated, now it mentions $13.04 per 1000 views:" (niklaslogren) [1]