Lead gen fraud
Incentivized traffic
A number of affiliates are sharing commissions with end users via rebates, social gaming credits, or donations to causes. These perks incentivize users to download browser toolbars and plug-ins. But users acquired this way tend to have much lower lifetime value. Low-quality publishers will often sell this incentivized activity as normal paid traffic. In other scenarios, the bad actor will stuff a cookie when the user visits sites that participate in affiliate programs.
How they do it
- Malicious publisher has registered for advertiser’s affiliate program
- User is incentivized to download malicious publisher’s toolbar
- User goes to advertiser’s website to shop
- User starts adding things to their shopping cart
- Before completing checkout, the toolbar drops a cookie in user’s browser, claiming credit for driving the sale
- User completes the purchase
- Advertiser attributes credit to malicious publisher, even though they provided no value in driving the sale, and pays them a percentage of revenue
