Mobile advertising has never been more popular than it is today. Global mobile ad spending will hit $230 billion this year with a growth rate of more than 20%.1 But as brands continue to shift their spending to mobile, fraudsters are trying to take advantage of this ecosystem. At Smaato, our top priority is to protect both mobile users and mobile investments, but we also want to help educate the market on the various types of fraud and how to fight it.
Mobile ad fraud is a scam committed by criminals that affects the entire supply chain: publishers, advertisers, and everyone in between. The methods used by fraudsters are increasingly sophisticated, as mobile ad fraud is conducted with the goal of evading detection to steal as much money as possible. The cost of ad fraud across all types of digital advertising totaled an estimated $19 billion in 2018.2