This week's review of ad fraud and quality in the digital advertising space.
"Three of the big industry trade groups representing the digital advertising ecosystem are hoping to gain support for a 'self-regulatory' program for the digital advertising industry to protect itself from the rise of ad blockers and rogue actions of the likes of Apple," reported Marketing Land. "The 4As, ANA and IAB have asked the Coalition for Better Ads (CBA) ... to adopt 'The Better Ads Experience Program,'" the article reads. "The Better Ads Standards set forth by the Coalition for Better Ads aim to address the worst aspects of digital advertising in order to stem the tide of ad blockers."
The Guardian has reported that "[m]illions of Pornhub users were targeted with a malvertising attack that sought to trick them into installing malware on their PCs," citing Proofpoint. "By the time the attack was uncovered, it had been active 'for more than a year,' Proofpoint said, having already 'exposed millions of potential victims in the US, Canada, the UK, and Australia' to malware by pretending to be software updates to popular browsers."
ExchangeWire has reported on an iotec survey which found that 41% of marketers are intimidated by mobile programmatic. Additionally, "[r]espondents said that the top three transparency concerns within the industry are fraud (33%), viewability (29%), and targeting (22%)," wrote ExchangeWire.
Ars Technica notes that "Benign iOS prompts are indistinguishable from those generated by malicious apps," citing work done by mobile app developer Felix Krause. "The root of the problem is that many of Apple's official password prompts are indistinguishable from ones generated by apps," wrote Ars Technica. "Most users respond by blindly trusting their password with either one."
The article continued: "In the meantime, iOS users can protect themselves by doing the following when they encounter a password popup: hit the home button. If the app and password prompt close, the prompt was likely a phishing attempt. If the dialog and app remain visible, the dialog was generated by iOS. Krause also suggested never entering passwords into any dialog box. Instead, we should dismiss it, manually open the iOS settings window, and enter the password there."
Pixalate has announced an upcoming webinar panel focused on ad fraud and best practices for working with publishers on quality. Panelists include experts from OpenX, Fyber, GrondTruth, Sovrn, and Pixalate. These experts will share common ad fraud issues they've faced along with unique ways they've overcome these challenges. They will also share what they're doing at an organizational level to reduce fraud and answer the most frequently-asked questions about ad quality. Reserve your spot today.
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