This afternoon I got a puzzling email from the folks at the Google Adsense department. Apparently it’s been detected that I have “invalid clicks” on my website.

It has come to our attention that invalid clicks have been generated on
the Google ads on your site(s).

As a reminder, any method of generating invalid clicks is strictly
prohibited. Invalid clicks include but are not limited to any clicks
that are generated through the use of robots, automated clicking tools,
manual clicks by a publisher on the publisher’s own web pages, or a
publisher encouraging others to click on his ads.

Alrighty then.. That’s remarkably vague and unhelpful. I replied back asking for what information may make them think they are invalid? What site are then on? What ads were they? Where were they coming from (ip address)? I got another form letter telling me to read their Terms and Policies.

Right now I’m at a loss as to what I should do next. I’m guessing that either this is an error, or it’s from Laura clicking on the various pregnancy-related ads that have appeared since I announced our new bundle of joy. Either way, I don’t think I’ve broken 5 clicks in a day yet, usually averaging about 1. How can this possibly be “fraud” ?

Well, it seems I’m not the only one asking this question. Just a little bit of digging around and you’ll find lots of storires. The most popular seems to be Benjamin Cohen’s story on Times Online where his account was revoked with little to no information as to why, but there are hundreds others. “rcd01″ on Sitepoint Forums and BrianHehe at Geek Village are both in the same situation as I, warned but not yet banned, but how can we prevent bans with no information on what we’re doing wrong? Google is no help, as any correspondence (whether reporting invalid clicks or asking for clarification) seems to result in the same form-letter responsed.

Although it does violate Adsense’s TOS, I’ve found instructions on how to modify the javascript to exclude certain IP’s (namely myself). I might try that in a bit to see if it helps. But that will do little to stop the click-bombs of angry visitors madly clicking on ads? Seems I’m just at google’s mercy at this point, hoping they won’t pull my account.

There’s an interview with Shuman Ghosemajumder, Business Product Manager for Trust & Safety, where he discusses a bit of click-fraud in the light of their recent settlement. Could it be that this is a paranoid knee-jerk response to the problem of click-fraud?

[tag:adsense][tag:google][tag:clickfraud]

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