14 DAY TRIAL // Google has purchased spider.io, a company that should help the Internet giant fight advertising fraud.
“Our immediate priority is to include their fraud detection technology in our video and display ads products, where they will complement our existing efforts. Over the long term, our goal is to improve the metrics that advertisers and publishers use to determine the value of digital media and give all parties a clearer, cleaner picture of what campaigns and media are truly delivering strong results,” writes Neal Mohan, Google vice president for Display Advertising.
The company will include spider.io’s fraud fighting expertise in its products so it can weed out bad actors and improve the overall digital ecosystem.
Furthermore, Google should improve its ad metrics in time, which should help it provide a clearer assessment of how its campaigns are doing.
Spider.io only has seven employees, which means that the deal is more an aqui-hire, hinting that Google was more interested in the talent behind the product.
Google has serious reasons to seek to fight against advertising fraud, considering that most of its revenue comes from selling ad space on the Internet. “Advertising helps fund the digital world we love today – inspiring videos, informative websites, entertaining apps and services that connect us with friends around the world,” Mohan wrote.
The company has been fighting this battle for a long time, doing its best to weed out the bad actors in the business in order to protect itself and its other customers.
“Over the years, we’ve invested significantly in the technology and talent to prevent fraud and create greater accountability online. For example, we put extensive resources towards keeping bad actors out of our ad systems -- last year alone, we turned down millions of applications from sites looking to join our network because of suspected fraudulent activity,” Mohan explains.
Now that it has spider.io, Google should find it even easier to fight this battle.