The latest Click Fraud Index from Click Forensics, which is out today, says that the fraudulent click rate is on the rise.

Key findings from data reported for Q2 2007 include:

• The overall industry average click fraud rate was 15.8 percent for Q2 2007. This is an increase from 14.1 percent for the same quarter in 2006 and 14.8 percent for Q1 2007.
• The average click fraud rate of PPC advertisements appearing on search engine content networks, including Google AdSense and the Yahoo Publisher Network, was 25.6 percent. That’s up from 21.9 percent for Q1 2007 and 19.2 percent for Q4 of 2006.
• Traffic from botnets doubled from Q1 to Q2 2007 and contributed significantly to the increase in click fraud rates.
• In Q2 2007, the greatest percentage of click fraud originating from countries outside North America came from France (5.1 percent), China (3.2 percent) and Australia (3 percent).

The report says that growing use of botnets is making the problem worse, with traffic from botnets doubling between Q1 and Q2.

Tom Cuthbert of Click Forensics said:

“A significant percentage of today’s click fraud traffic can be attributed to two growing areas of concern for search advertisers – traffic that comes from botnets and from parked domains or made-for-ad sites.

“Advertisers running campaigns on content networks are especially vulnerable as they are increasingly targets of this growing pool of savvy fraudsters.”

SOURCE : ClickFraudNetwork