According to a spokesperson from Integral Ad Science, the company utilizes a variety of services before and after brands bid on ads to protect its clients. They stated that they continuously assess and improve their services to adapt to the evolving digital landscape. Human Security did not provide a comment on the findings from Adalytics as they had not seen the complete report.
DoubleVerify criticized the Adalytics report as "misleading and manufactured." They mentioned that they detect non-human traffic post-ad bidding, ensuring advertisers do not pay for such impressions, even if they miss them beforehand. Laura Edelson, a computer science professor, compared catching bots to identifying a person versus a person-shaped sock puppet claiming to be a puppet.
The top three companies—DoubleVerify, Integral Ad Science, and Human Security—that advertisers rely on to identify and filter out bots were reported by Adalytics to frequently miss non-human traffic. This included instances where well-known brands’ ads were shown on websites to bots, even when bots self-identified for benign purposes like web archiving and security monitoring.
A significant portion of web traffic consists of fake users or bots, with Cloudflare estimating it to be at least 40%. Advertisers invest billions in ads without certainty if they reach real human audiences, and the companies providing ad verification services struggle to ensure ad authenticity.
Ad verification vendors monitor ad auctions to distinguish between human and bot viewers before ad placements are confirmed. Adalytics focuses on post-analysis of bot exposure, competing with DoubleVerify, Integral Ad Science, and Human Security.
Limitations exist in the current software used to detect bots pre-bid, as some platforms fail to provide essential data to identify bots effectively. Despite some shortcomings, these companies aim to offer advertisers valuable information to prevent bidding on fraudulent ad impressions.
An example highlighted by Adalytics showed that bot-filtering companies failed to avert ad placement on a news site to bots for brands like IBM and Tylenol. The Guardian assured steps are taken to avoid serving ads to bots and pledged to compensate brands for misdirected campaign traffic.
Several publishers, including The Wall Street Journal, employ Integral Ad Science to safeguard against bot-delivered ads. DoubleVerify's products are also used by publishers and advertisers alike. Notably, a publisher conducting a bot detection analysis found shortcomings in DoubleVerify's ability to prevent ad serving to bots.
Detecting fraudulent activity from bots that mimic human behavior poses a significant challenge. Some scammers mimic human browsing patterns to deceive ad auctions and capitalize on ad revenue. Advertisers are entitled to refunds if significant bot activity is uncovered retrospectively, but low bot rates reported by verification vendors often deter advertisers from seeking refunds.
A company investing in pre-bid filtering technology questioned its efficacy after reviewing Adalytics' report. The comparison-shopping site's senior VP mentioned doubts regarding the technology's effectiveness in identifying bots accurately.
For more information, you can reach out to Patience Haggin at [email protected].