What is incentivized traffic - lead gen fraud - Impact
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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.

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How they do it

  1. Malicious publisher has registered for advertiser’s affiliate program
  2. User is incentivized to download malicious publisher’s toolbar
  3. User goes to advertiser’s website to shop
  4. User starts adding things to their shopping cart
  5. Before completing checkout, the toolbar drops a cookie in user’s browser, claiming credit for driving the sale
  6. User completes the purchase
  7. Advertiser attributes credit to malicious publisher, even though they provided no value in driving the sale, and pays them a percentage of revenue
Incentivized traffic
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