While ad fraud is not a new phenomenon, it remains an ongoing issue for the ad tech industry that requires greater attention, given the scale at which ad fraud is occurring in the inventories of advertisers and marketers.
Digital ad fraud refers to the act of misrepresenting or intentionally tampering with engagement metrics, generating fraudulent traffic and impressions, and thereby affecting click-through rates and revenue generation.
With programmatic advertising serving as a helpful tool for advertisers and publishers to engage in automated marketing in the new digital era, ad fraud is almost inevitable, with professionals of all sizes at risk of encountering bad actors in one way or another.
In this guide, we walk you through the various layers of ad fraud and the most effective ad fraud prevention techniques, with the assistance of top ad fraud detection companies, to block fraudsters from exploiting your marketing efforts.
What is ad fraud?
To put it in the simplest terms, ad fraud occurs when advertisements are paid for and published on fraudulent websites, or when impressions, clicks, and installs are faked to exploit the mobile advertising technology system to generate fraudulent revenue.
Mobile ad frauds come in a variety of formats and is not always easy to detect. But in essence, the concept is commonly popular among cybercriminals and typically combines identity fraud and attribution fraud.
Fake activity and metrics, such as traffic and data events, are disguised as real user behaviour to benefit from financial gain. Ad fraud typically involves using bots to carry out attempts to manipulate the flow of the usual advertising process, from advertisers to the target users.
Fraudulent publishers are among the most common online ad fraudsters, using automated bots to repeatedly click on ads, thereby increasing advertisers’ revenue while earning advertising fees intended for legitimate publishers.
As this is an essential topic for mobile marketers and advertisers to understand, it is also crucial for you to be aware of the types of fraudulent acts in digital advertising, enabling you to detect malicious actors before they cause irreparable damage to your marketing strategies and budgets.
The best ad fraud detection companies
Ad fraud detection companies are specialised firms that help advertisers and publishers identify and prevent fake or invalid traffic, clicks, impressions, and conversions in digital advertising.
These companies use a mix of algorithms, machine learning, and human analysis to detect suspicious behaviour, such as bots, click farms, ad stacking, and domain spoofing.
We’ve listed the best ad fraud detection companies below.
1. Perform[cb]
Perform[cb] is a performance‑based marketing platform established in 2002 (originally known as Clickbooth). It operates as a CPA (cost-per-action) affiliate network and agency, focusing on driving measurable outcomes such as leads, app installs, calls, or sales—so advertisers pay only when a desired action occurs.
Beyond offering traditional CPA traffic, Perform[cb] provides full‑service affiliate program management, media buying across multiple channels, creative support, and optimisation tools driven by AI-based bidding algorithms. Its fraud detection system—PerformSHIELD—monitors traffic quality in real time to prevent invalid or fraudulent conversions.
Overview
Perform[cb] began operations in 2002 under the original name Clickbooth. It has since evolved into the unified brand known today as Perform[cb].
Its current CEO, Erin Cigich, joined in the early years—initially as an affiliate manager—and over the course of more than a decade, rose through the ranks to lead the company through major milestones, including its rebranding and tech expansions.
Services
Perform[cb] provides its customers with the following services:
- CPA affiliate campaigns where you pay only for actions like leads, installs, calls, or sales
- Media buying and full-service affiliate program management, including creative optimisation
- Real‑time fraud protection through PerformSHIELD monitoring
2. mFilterIt
mFilterIt specialises in ad fraud detection and prevention, helping advertisers, agencies, and publishers ensure their media investments reach real users and not bots (or invalid traffic).
The platform’s flagship solution, Valid8, delivers real-time traffic validation across web, app, OTT, and CTV environments.
It utilises machine learning, behavioural analysis, and log-level data to flag issues such as click injection, incentive fraud, geo spoofing, bot traffic, and other sophisticated threats, helping marketers optimise ROI and protect their brand reputation while maintaining transparency and campaign efficacy.
Overview
mFilterIt was founded in 2015 in Gurugram, India, by Amit Relan and Dhiraj Gupta (with Jatin Kapoor also named among co‑founders). Amit Relan took on the CEO role, while Dhiraj Gupta serves as CTO. The company was launched to bring transparency and trust to digital advertising by detecting invalid traffic and fraud in real time.
Under their leadership, mFilterIt has grown into a global ad‑fraud detection and digital integrity platform.
Services
mFilterIt provides its customers with the following services:
- Real-time ad fraud detection using AI and behavioural analysis
- Creative and brand safety compliance to prevent unauthorised content
- Campaign performance analytics providing traffic quality insights and validation reports
3. Fraud Blocker
Fraud Blocker is a click fraud protection platform founded in 2019 that helps advertisers prevent wasted ad spend by detecting and blocking invalid (or harmful traffic). It identifies suspicious behaviour, such as bots, competitor clicks, click farms, and accidental taps, using real-time monitoring and advanced detection methods, including device fingerprinting and IP tracking.
Designed for advertisers running campaigns on platforms like Google Ads and Meta Ads, Fraud Blocker offers detailed analytics, fraud scoring, and traffic insights to help users refine targeting and improve return on investment.
Overview
Fraud Blocker was founded in 2019 and is headquartered in Los Angeles, USA. It was co‑founded by Mike Schrobo (who serves as CEO) and Brandon Tome (Chief Growth Officer).
The platform was created to address the growing issue of wasted ad spend due to invalid or fraudulent clicks in digital campaigns.
Services
Fraud Blocker provides its customers with the following services:
- Real-time click fraud detection using device fingerprinting, IP tracking, and bot behaviour analysis
- Automated ad account integration to block suspicious IPs and sources
- Fraud scoring and performance dashboards offer detailed insights into suspicious behaviour
What are the different types of mobile ad fraud?
It can be difficult to accurately categorise the types of ad fraud to detect and monitor them on an individual level, as they can often blend in with one another. Nonetheless, we have put together a list of the everyday fraudulent acts that typically take place in the digital advertising sphere:
Click fraud
Click fraud is one of the most common types of ad fraud, typically committed by malicious bots. The act describes bots that exploit pay-per-click (PPC) ads by spending the advertiser’s entire budget and generating false traffic by running click farms.
The aim here is to impersonate a real user so that the ad platform thinks the webpage or ad content receives more clicks than it does. As click fraud occurs on a larger scale, an emulator is used to repeatedly ‘click’ each link to establish an automated process, targeting multiple links simultaneously.
One will see a massive boost in CTR of their ads, but will not see an increase in conversions.
Click injection
Similarly, click injection refers to the simulation of high click-through rates, but with app installs. In this case, a fraudster creates fake clicks during app installs, claiming attribution for these installs.
Fraudsters publish an app, which listens to ‘install broadcasts’ – a signal when an app is launched for the first time. This way, they can detect when other apps are downloaded on a device, allowing fraudsters to inject clicks before the installation is complete, thereby receiving false credit for the installation.
The act of generating an oddly high number of traffic, installs and other key metrics is a common form of mobile ad fraud, which is carried out by an automated clicking platform.
Similar fraud types include the following to create excessive numbers:
- Impression fraud
- Conversion fraud
- Data fraud
Ad stacking
The ad stacking concept takes place in programmatic ad placements, where ad units are stacked on top of each other, as the name suggests. A publisher sells multiple ads on a platform, placing them one on top of the other, causing each to gain more impressions.
This way, the fraudster can get credit for all of the impressions the ads receive, while the user only views one of these ads, as one advertisement is disguised behind another.
Ad injection
Another type of ad fraud that exploits advertising platforms is ad injection, where fraudsters take advantage of compromised browser extensions, plugins, and other malware to place ads where they aren’t meant to be displayed, or to replace existing ads initially placed by a legitimate publisher.
The fraudster receives revenue when these ads are monetised, with publishers losing a significant amount of money, despite owning the inventory.
Domain spoofing
Domain spoofing involves posing as a legitimate and reputable domain. Advertisers are then tricked into paying premium prices to secure fake ad placements, in the belief that the website is valuable.
Bad actors will create a fake site that looks original and then attempt to generate revenue by purchasing low-quality traffic and serving advertising from multiple networks, despite never truly reaching the intended target market.
SDK spoofing
SDK spoofing is a type of ad fraud that involves creating a bot within an app, which then sends illegitimate clicks and installs using data from real devices, without any actual installations.
The bot also engages with MMPs (mobile measurement partners) that register them as genuine. SDK spoofing is also referred to as traffic spooking or replay attacks.
Location masking
Also known as geo masking, the concept maximises traffic that is more valuable in other regions or countries by allowing fraudsters to disguise themselves as being from a particular location.
Bad actors typically hide where they receive traffic from and sell non-valuable traffic to advertisers at higher prices, with advertisers paying for something they ultimately receive no results from.
Bot traffic
Bot traffic describes invalid traffic that does not qualify as legitimate ad traffic and, therefore, cannot be considered a valid metric when measuring KPIs. Ad traffic is considered invalid when it is non-human, such as from spiders or bots, or involves suspicious activity that generates malicious traffic.
This type of ad fraud is just another variation of fraudsters posing their behaviour as legitimate, which includes acts of incentivising clicks, misleading user interface, as well as fake browser automation.
Why do I need ad fraud detection tools?
Digital ad fraud is a particularly important topic for marketers and online advertisers to understand, as it can have a significant impact on campaign budgets and ultimately harm performance and revenue in the long term.
It is estimated that the costs of digital advertising fraud will increase drastically between 2018 and 2023, from $35 billion to as much as $100 billion, confirming that ad fraud remains a critical problem for ad networks and marketers alike.
It is also worth noting that mobile fraudsters account for nearly 18% of the internet’s traffic within the marketing industry, with the largest ad markets, such as the United States, China, and the United Kingdom, reporting significant economic losses caused by ad fraud alone.
While mobile advertising fraud may sound like an issue primarily concerning those in the IT areas of advertising, anyone who consumes online content, including professionals establishing businesses and ad campaigns within the app world, can fall victim to bad bots.
Mobile ad fraud detection companies are dedicated to eliminating malicious actions and preventing fraudsters from delivering ads to your target users, thereby exploiting your ad platform and campaigns and stealing your well-earned revenue.
Until we are gifted with the ultimate AI solution that eliminates the endless battle with mobile fraudsters once and for all, we can turn to ad fraud detection companies and prevention software to stabilise our ad campaigns and effectively protect our revenue.
With the help of top ad fraud detection companies, you can rest assured that, as a programmatic advertiser, you invest in quality and secure inventory with legitimate, human traffic and clicks that you can rely on to run successful and profitable ad campaigns.
Now that you know just how vital ad fraud detection tools are and how companies that provide such can benefit the health and sustainability of your ad campaigns, it is also helpful to learn the best ad fraud detection techniques yourself.
How do I detect ad fraud?
Because the realm of ad fraud is so complex, the scale at which fraudsters and scammers are evolving is becoming greater. Advertisers are now required to become their own masters of ad fraud and filter out the bad bots themselves.
But how does one detect these mobile fraudsters in such a complex ecosystem? And how can you identify malicious activity before it inflicts long-term damage on your campaigns and marketing strategies?
Here is a breakdown of some crucial warning signs that you should pay attention to:
- Little to no performance
- Very slow conversion rates –> unusually less revenue
- Odd spikes in CTRs, number of clicks and/or impressions
- Poor on-site performance (bounce rates, session duration)
- Unknown, suspicious site placements
Keeping an eye out for these factors can significantly decrease the possibility of a destructive impact on your campaign. When spotting these warning signs, be sure to investigate the activity further to reduce the risk of exposure to malicious bots.
How to prevent mobile ad fraud?
Knowing how to detect mobile ad fraud and recognise unusual behaviour on your site and with analytical tools, you are surely eager to learn how to prevent the concept from actually happening.
While there is no single formula to entirely avoid ad fraud, there are essential safety checks that you should have in place to prevent malicious behaviour in its early stages, thereby best protecting your campaigns.
Ad fraud prevention techniques
The most common aspect of ad fraud to focus on is preventing fake traffic from being associated with your paid channels and ensuring that your ad spend generates revenue to the correct channels, thereby accelerating user engagement.
Ad fraud prevention tools will analyse every install event and clicks in real-time – yes, each and every one of them. They will also actively search for unusual and suspicious activities that may indicate fraudulent behaviour.
Another essential tool is keeping your database clean and updated, so you can rest assured that your campaigns are being carried out and analysed based on accurate and up-to-date data.
This will minimise the number of false positives showing up in your data analysis and reviews.
Know your ad network
Apart from keeping a close eye on your data and ensuring you track every single traffic event while maintaining clean records, you also want to choose the right ad network that you can trust.
Before you make any efforts to combat mobile fraud, you need to know which platforms your ads are running on, making a transparent and legitimate platform absolutely essential for effectively detecting and protecting your assets.
Use an ads.text file
It is also beneficial to have an ads.text file in place to accurately identify which ad networks, ad exchanges and supply-side platforms (SSPs) are being used by web pages that resell your inventory.
Details about the SSPs, including their inventory, placement ID, and relationship with the said web page, as well as whether they have been authorised by you to market your ad space, are crucial information to help eliminate the possibility of ad fraud.
Don’t forget to also ensure your monetisation partner is implementing a legitimate Seller.json file. This way, you can confirm the source of the inventory and impressions from which they are being purchased.
Partner with top ad fraud companies
Partnering with our top ad fraud detection companies will help you accurately detect automated bots and fraudulent activities in your campaigns.
As the realm of mobile ad fraud is highly complex, it requires a high level of specialisation and expertise. There are several ad fraud detection platforms out there that focus on the buying and selling of ad placements.
With the newfound knowledge gained from this guide and an understanding of the key signals of fraudulent activity, you can carefully select the company that best serves the protection of your inventory.
The list we have compiled for you below includes trusted partners who will accurately monitor key metrics and user behaviour, ensuring the quality of your traffic and ad placements, as well as combating malware—all for the sustainable health and success of your business.
