Click Bombing

[snickles121]

I was checking my adsense account this morning and noticed that I had a extremely high ctr on one of my channels. Usually I only get a few people a day looking at this particular page.

It apparently looks like that one person clicked on 20 ads inside of a link unit. Im showing 25 page impressions for that link unit and 20 clicks.

This is the first time that Im aware that this has happened to me. My overall ctr for the site is normal, but should I be worried about this particular incident.

Note: If this particular page wasnt tracked I would have never even noticed it. Anyone had this type of thing happen and what did you do?

[cien]

Happened to me once but I didn't contact Google as I read many people had reported click bombing to Google and their accounts got shut down after review. I let it go and received a check just fine. I figure the clicks were legal or Google invalidated them. If it was clickbombing, maybe your site was part of a clickbombing range and Google probably does nothing to those accounts but invalidate the offending clicks. Who knows.

[edited by: cien at 8:55 pm (utc) on Jan 30, 2011]

[PascoalINC]

Yes, when one of my idiot friends thought he was making me rich by clicking at "insane mode". I almost got banned.

[koan]

It seems to me it should be pretty easy for Google to just discard more than a few clicks from one person per hour.

[snickles121]

Thats what I thought too about telling them. I been reading about people reporting it and then getting banned. I just took that link unit off that page for now and hopefully they wont be back.

[incrediBILL]

I just took that link unit off that page for now and hopefully they wont be back.

Was it tracked via a URL channel or a custom channel?

Besides, taking it off the page doesn't take it out of the page on Google cache, or his browsers cache if it's still on his screen, or a local copy if they saved the page locally, or from the internet archives even (Archive.org).

Don't think real crazy things don't happen because I use a page tracking system like LivePerson that allows me to monitor all pages being viewed, assuming they have javascript enabled.

Sometimes I see a page being viewed from something like "file:///C:/Users/JoesPC/Desktop/mypage.html" so I'll break in for a chat "stealing my stuff Joe?" and the connection usually goes >POOF!< instantly as Joe has a heart attack.

I've had idiots copy my pages to their new site leaving both my AdSense and LivePerson intact, real easy to find the first time someone opens that page :)

Anyway, the point was, your website is the least of your vulnerabilities, and you can tighten control by eliminating SE cache copies or archives where nitwits go to play games with your site.

[martinibuster]

It's common for people to click more than one ad. I have been told it is normal behavior for an ad clicker to click more than once.

[edited by: martinibuster at 9:04 pm (utc) on Jan 30, 2011]

[HuskyPup]

I often get users surfing my link ads since, in general, my products are not cheap and not available from all the advertisers who usually target both accurate and generic trade products therefore it is quite common for users to have a good look around.

In the past when I'd had a couple of hundred or so clicks and advised the team they were already aware and had discounted them therefore I've not bothered telling them since then!

The most annoying thing was that they left the clicks showing therefore the CTR looked fantastic but the EPC terrible.

[snickles121]

Incredibill..

I tracked this particular link with a custom channel in adsense. The visitor from what I could tell actually came from a genuine search when I viewed my google analyics account just now.

I really think he has just looking around inside the link unit, but its seems a little excessive to me. But if you think about it, google must know that this is going to happen from time to time, especially inside of a link unit.

I have also had a bunch of idiots copy my pages and claim them as there own, but even if they have my adsense code on them it wont do much harm to my account because I only have two sites, which I own, in my "allowed sites" in my adsense account. I have noticed that the cached versions get blocked from showing ads that count.

[johnmoose]

I see these double clicks too. Seems like that people don't really know that links on the internet do not need to be double clicked. Still wondering if it can be stopped somehow.