1) Unrealistically short time between clicks and targeted actions

Standard Internet connection speed allows you to download the application in 30 seconds. In this case, installations from one channel can take 2-10 seconds. Such traffic can be considered fraudulent.

2) Obviously patterned user behavior after clicking on an ad

Real users spend different amounts of time deciding to download an app and browsing internal pages. They will have different Internet connection speeds and different purposes for entering the application/website.

A channel that consistently shows the same sequence of user actions or equal intervals between clicks is most likely to cause fraud.

3) Different geo clicks and settings for the same user

Any device connected to the Internet has an IP address. It contains information about the region you are in. If the user surfs the mobile Internet, the IP address comes from the mobile provider. If the user connects to the Internet via Wi-Fi, the IP comes from the Internet connection point.

Clicking in one region and downloading an application in another is almost impossible.

4) Abnormally many clicks from one IP/ID

This is the first sign that you are receiving traffic from a bot farm. Although such indicators may also indicate the work of real people. For example, if fraudsters reset the advertising identifiers of the devices from which they are fraudulent, and perform installations and targeted actions again.

5) Too little or too much click-to-install conversion

If the conversion from clicks to installs is below 0.3% with a large flow of traffic, most likely fraudsters are clicking on ads.

A conversion above 30% is also a sign of fraud. These values ​​are realistic for search campaigns. In other cases, there is a high probability that the installations are not real. The same goes for unrealistically high or negligible CTRs and

eCPM. If their values ​​for a particular channel differ too much from the average, you can add the source to the list of fraudulent ones.

6) Suspicious activity at night

Typically, users within the same geo are more active in the morning, afternoon or evening. And programs that generate fraud can work 24 hours a day. Many clicks and installs at night, similar in number to organic indicators at other times of the day, raise suspicion. A source with such traffic needs additional checks.

As a rule, most actual installations occur within the first hour after a click. By the second hour, the number of installations drops sharply. In fraud campaigns, due to the specifics of how programs work, the installation curve is much more even.

8) Lack of basic events

If you monitor the hello screen or app opening and see that these actions do not occur after installation, you are most likely faced with fraud.

Fraudsters can imitate a report on the completion of a targeted action in the analytics system. Then you will see a report about the installation and the necessary in-app activity, while the steps required for real users will be skipped.

An extremely low Retention Rate and the removal of the application immediately after installation indicates motivated traffic: scammers download the application and immediately delete it. A rare but possible case: the application was downloaded by a real user, but did not want/forgot to use it.

Types of Fraud

Spoofing SDK

SDK spoofing is a type of fraud in which fraudsters control the transmission of messages between the application SDK and the server that receives the information.

The original messages are changed to ones that are more beneficial to the advertiser. For example, a report on the display of a banner is a signal about downloading an application. So you see new installations that weren't actually there.

Click spam

A type of spam in which scammers insert banners so that users do not see them and click on them without knowing it. For example, you click on the play button on a free online movie theater website and are taken to a third-party site. Or you play a game inside the application and each tap on the screen counts as a click on banners that you don’t even see. These clicks count as ad clicks

Signs that you have become a victim of this type of fraud:

• Organic install volumes have dropped sharply;
• paid users behave the same way as those who came from organic installs.

Click injection

In some classifications it is identified as a subtype of click spam. The user installs an application with malicious code. Typically, these are fake copies of popular applications or applications in the “tools” category. The fraud source tag is assigned to the infected device.

When a user (even long after the code has been deployed) downloads the desired application, the installation will be counted as coming from a click on an ad, because it will have a corresponding label in analytics.

Only smartphones with the Android operating system can suffer from this type of fraud.

Typically, this type of attack is indicated by a very short (>2 seconds) time period between click and installation.

Bot traffic

Fraudsters create farms where they collect large numbers of smartphones. The devices are connected to a program that simulates the actions of real users on them: clicking on advertisements, installing applications, watching videos, etc. There is another option for organizing a farm: instead of many devices, a program is used that creates virtual copies of devices with constantly updated IDs. The program still simulates the actions of real users, but on the server.

To avoid detection, scammers change IP addresses and route traffic through TOR or VPN.

Most likely your installations are fake:

• if they are immediately followed by deleting the application;
• if the analytics contains many clicks/installs from one IP address.

Incentivized traffic

There are special sites where users are paid for performing certain actions: clicks, installations, in-app actions, etc. Such traffic is called motivated because users perform targeted actions for a certain reward. Usually this is real small money or in-game currency. On average, up to 200 rubles per targeted action.

Sometimes users are prompted to perform actions offline. For example, a motivated user can leave a request to view an apartment in a new building and even go for a viewing.

Traffic is most likely motivated if:

• the retention rate from one channel is consistently low;
• users delete the application immediately after downloading or download and do not log in;
• users who download apps for a reward are often sent scripts based on activity in the app. Download, click on certain buttons, delete after three days. Therefore, in analytics there can be many many installations with the same behavior model.

How to protect yourself from fraud

1) Update your SDKs

In new versions, protection systems against fraudulent traffic are also updated.

2) Discuss risks with contractors

At the beginning of work, discuss with your contractors how payment and further work will happen if you discover fraud. Write down in the contract what you will do in such cases. For example, you can stipulate which traffic, based on indicators in analytics, will be considered fraud and will not be paid for.

3) Remove contractors with fraudulent traffic

If you or your anti-fraud system has detected fraudulent traffic that comes in large quantities from one of the contractors, apply penalties to this company. If this happens repeatedly, then it is easier to disable the channel that supplies low-quality traffic.

4) Don't target suspicious OS versions

Do not target advertising to devices with outdated or not yet released OS. As a rule, bot farms purchase old smartphones that only support older versions of the OS. This way you will cut off a small percentage of real users, but you will avoid fraud attacks.

5) Follow the analytics

Analysis of conversions by IP, device-info, time between click and conversion, user life after installing the application, conversions via VPN or proxy can reveal fraud.

6) Use services with built-in antifraud

Mobile trackers and analytics systems have their own anti-fraud solutions: Adjust, Appsflyer, Fraudlogix

All of these programs cost money. To evaluate the feasibility of investing in an anti-fraud solution, you can test the trial version. If during the trial period the system detects fraudulent traffic in an amount that covers its cost, then it is worth renewing the subscription.

CPI networks are associated with a large number of small traffic providers, which makes them a favorable area for scammers. It is also an important and large channel. The budgets allocated for it are decent, which means losses from fraud can be significant.

When detecting fraud from a CPI network, you need to look at sub-sources and disable those from which the fraud comes. If the total volume of fraud from the network does not fall below 10%, despite constant work to disable suspicious sub-sources, you can try to figure out the reason. Perhaps transfer the budget to a more reliable source.

An anti-fraud tool saves a lot of time, replacing the need for manual processing of large amounts of data. Serves as a mediator, giving his guarantees in controversial situations with partners. And, of course, it saves the budget by helping to weed out fraud.

I tested several large services and did not find any noticeable advantages over others in any of them. A more effective solution, in my opinion, can only be the development of an internal solution.

Stanislav Izmailov, marketing manager at BlaBlaCar

Fraud and GSM

International Association of Network Operators GSM has developed its own classification for fraud crimes.

According to Mummert+Partner, more than 1.5 million mobile phone owners annually refuse to pay their bills.

SMS fraud

Fraud is used to steal funds from mobile phones.

Fraud is a method of exceeding the limit on the number of messages sent SMS-requests due to the technical capabilities of the platform OSS, leading to the subscriber receiving the ordered services without actually paying for them.

It is possible to open a paid service, with a payment method via SMS messages. In this case, it is technically possible to obtain a negative balance on a SIM card with a debit tariff plan.

To prevent this type of fraud, a fraud threshold is used, which is updated for each number once every 60 minutes.

Options GSM fraud

Fraud and credit cards

Credit Card Fraud ( carding includes theft of card data on the Internet ( phishing), copying the information contained on the magnetic stripe of the card ( skimming), as well as fraud when paying in the absence of a card (Card not present transaction English). Another way is refunds ( chargeback).

Operations with counterfeit cards are also fraud. Credit cards are counterfeited like this: a hybrid card is taken, the records of its magnetic stripe are copied and transferred to another card with only a magnetic stripe or to a hybrid card with a “crooked” chip (for example, burnt or non-personalized). Operations will be successfully performed either in offline mode (sub-limit operations) or in fallback mode. Responsibility for such fraud lies with issuer cards.

Notes

Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.

See what "Fraud" is in other dictionaries:

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The term fraud now refers to any fraud in IT. Carding refers to any illegal transactions with a bank card. We specialize in preventing card fraud in e-commerce. The problem is that when starting their online business, entrepreneurs, as a rule, first of all think about the cost of accepting payments and know little about the risks associated with fraud. The most popular questions from merchants (trade and service enterprises, online stores, merchants) are given below.

What is fraud?
Card fraud is something that can slow down the development of an online business. If a product or service is used by a fraudster, both the product and the money are lost. The easiest way is to buy a product on the website by entering the card number and other numbers printed on it when paying. But at the same time, the card will be someone else’s - the entered data can be photographed or spied on, obtained through technological fraud with ATMs or through poorly protected sites of other online stores. It is also no secret that a large number of databases with details of stolen cards are floating around the Internet.

Why is it dangerous to miss a fraud?
Because the real card holder will definitely write an application to the bank for the return of the amount written off without his knowledge, i.e. initiates the chargeback procedure. In the event of an unauthorized transaction on a bank card through an online store, the issuing bank that issued the card, on behalf of the card holder, will protest the transaction and the merchant will be obliged to refund the entire cost of the purchase. If controversial situations arise related to challenging suspicious transactions, the acquiring bank may incur additional costs in the amount of several hundred dollars for each case of arbitration on the part of international payment systems (IPS), which the bank will be happy to cede to the merchant. Particularly painful losses will occur in low-margin businesses. For example, with a sales margin of 2-3%, a merchant will need to sell several dozen product units just to cover the resulting loss from one fraudulent transaction. At the same time, a high average bill further aggravates the problem - this is where fraudsters’ “preferences” for the categories of goods and services purchased are formed. Some of the hottest industries are travel and retail.

And that's not all. In the event that the number of fraudulent transactions reaches 1% of the total number of all transactions, IPS VISA and MasterCard have the right to impose penalties on the acquiring bank, and therefore the merchant. After reaching the fraud threshold, the merchant enters into a global audit program, after which the acquiring bank must request from the merchant an action plan to reduce the level of fraud and strictly control the number of fraudulent transactions over the next months. If repeated violations are detected, the merchant is issued a warning and then fines ranging from $5,000, which can be increased to a very impressive $200,000 in particularly severe cases. At the same time, separate monitoring of transactions is carried out in the context of cards issued by foreign and domestic issuers; exceeding the threshold value only for foreign cards may also be grounds for including merchants in the audit program. In particularly advanced cases, the merchant may be disqualified, which will lead to the impossibility of accepting cards for payment through any bank in the future. It is worth noting that serious financial consequences can occur for the acquiring bank itself if the situation for all clients as a whole is bad.

Fraud is a global organized business. Violators are organized into groups, and each of these groups works in its own area. Attackers band together through social networks and specialized forums to help each other and share their experiences using the most successful attack patterns to achieve maximum productivity. Therefore, if there is a one-time fraud in an online store, in the shortest possible time several more groups will try to carry out fraudulent transactions - this phenomenon is called a “snowball”. And since the motivation is very strong - money, the speed with which scammers will attack the store will increase proportionally to their number.

What is antifraud?
Reliable antifraud is a service that prevents fraudsters from cashing out money and buying goods using someone else’s bank card through an online store.

In addition to the simplest protection settings that any merchant can set, such as protection against CVV and card number selection; analysis of card parameters by bank, owner, product type, country of issue and geography of use; identification of the buyer based on purchase history; retrospective analysis of purchases; detection of suspicious transactions using fingerprints of the equipment used; checking the domain and IP address, etc., we can set up rules and filters unique to each online store.

Our patents for security and payment authentication:

Does antifraud reduce conversions?
Yes, antifraud generally reduces conversions. Our goal is to minimize the number of false positives and ensure the highest possible conversion rate at the selected risk level. Conversion is adversely affected by any rough settings (usually standard vendor solutions on the bank’s side) and the standard implementation of 3-D Secure dynamic authorization technology for 100% of processed transactions. The disadvantage of the Verified by Visa and MasterCard SecureCode solutions is that, at the current time, not all banks are able to process incoming requests correctly and conveniently for the cardholder, which in some cases leads to the inability to confirm the intention to complete a transaction, and therefore reduces the conversion. In many cases, it will be much more effective to selectively apply 3DS authorization to cards of individual issuers and/or buyers who are suspicious based on a combination of other parameters. Payture patents provide for the use of its own dynamic authorization technology CheckCode (verification code), free from some of the disadvantages of standard Visa and MasterCard solutions, which we will discuss separately in future publications. Antifraud allows you to simplify the purchasing process for ordinary buyers, as well as monitor and notify about suspicious transactions online.

How much does antifraud cost?
Standard business model in our market: take Internet acquiring, antifraud is included. But in fact, we have long separated antifraud into a separate service, which we provide both together with acquiring and independently of it. This allows merchants from around the world to use our competencies in identifying and preventing fraud in international markets, to manage risks in the local Russian market for those non-resident merchants who have many years of experience in cooperation with global money receiving operators who have limited expertise in activities in our country .

The cost of the antifraud service depends on the number of transactions over a period of time and the need to access additional (paid) sources of information on any type of business: from 0.75 rubles to 6 rubles per transaction. We also have various options for package offers that allow merchants to spend money more economically with a good understanding of their risks and turnover in physical and value terms.

Aren't fraudsters mostly a problem for banks?
This is the opinion of not only TSP representatives, but also 90% of Russians surveyed according to the all-Russian sample of the NAFI center (National Agency for Financial Research). To a much greater extent, Internet scammers are a problem for entrepreneurs. In accordance with Article No. 9 of the Federal Law “On the National Payment System,” the operator is obliged to reimburse the client “the amount of the transaction performed without the client’s consent,” and then, according to the rules of the International Payment System, the bank charges this amount from the merchant. Yes, bank security departments work closely with various government agencies. Major thefts are most often brought to court, but cases of fraudulent payments using bank cards through online stores are currently practically not investigated in Russia. Although the total amount of damage from carding (fraudsters are residents of the CIS) is $680 million for 2013-2014. and 3-6 thousand cards of Russian banks are compromised every week.

Over the past 10 years, the bank card data market has finally been structured and has come to the organization of mass automated sales channels in the form of electronic trading platforms. According to Group-IB (a company that investigates cybercrimes and high-tech fraud), in 2014 there were 6.78 million cards in just one such store.

And if you want to accept cards for payment, you should know that card fraud is one of the most difficult to punish and actively developing types of fraud.

Why is card fraud popular?
Because a bank card is a convenient and fastest growing payment tool on the Internet. The number of cards issued in the Russian Federation in 2014 amounted to 220 million. In large cities, every second adult resident has two or more bank cards. Two-thirds of Russians use a bank card to pay for goods/services and withdraw cash almost every day.

If we compare it with e-commerce turnover, which grows annually by an average of 10-15%, then the number of fraud attempts increases by at least 25% per year. According to our data, in 2014, about 10% of all transactions in online stores were attempts to make a fraudulent payment using a card.

How do I know if I had a fraudulent transaction?
There is no way without operational fraud monitoring. You will learn about this only after some time; MPS provides cardholders with a period of up to six months from the actual date of service provision. This is the time when cardholders, according to the rules of the Ministry of Railways, can write an application to protest the transaction. For example, if we are talking about the sale of an air ticket with a departure three months from the date of the order, then the deadline for closing the possibility of contesting the transaction will be up to

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Fraud is a type of fraud in the field of information technology, any leak of personal data that leads to the enrichment of attackers.

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How fraud works in real life

Let's consider in practice what is considered fraud.

Larisa wants to buy a beautiful and high-quality handbag, but at a low price. She browses online stores for deals and finds the perfect model. On the website, she puts it in the cart, places an order and pays for the goods. She does not take into account that the site where she ordered the desired handbag and made the payment is unsafe, and all her bank card details were found out by fraudsters.

After receiving Larisa's card details, the scammer quickly looks for a method to get her money. The offender finds a seller and purchases goods from him for 10,000 rubles. The seller purchases a product from his supplier for 7,000 rubles, and immediately sells it to the fraudster for 10,000 rubles.

Larisa looks at the statement from her card and realizes that her funds are disappearing somewhere. She goes to the bank and asks to sort it out and return her earned money. The bank will satisfy Larisa’s application and requests a forced refund of funds from the seller - 10,000 rubles, and charges a commission of 2,000 rubles.

Summary of the story:

1. Larisa has returned all the money and is looking for a new place to buy her handbag.
2. The bank complied with the client's request and increased its reputation.
3. Payment processing took this seller into account. If repeated fraud occurs, the payment processing refuses to cooperate with the unsafe online store and provide services to this seller.
4. The supplier has earned money and will not issue a refund. Proper protection against fraud is the responsibility of the seller.
5. The fraudster was pleased with the free product purchased with someone else’s money, written off from a bank card.

The seller (online store) suffered losses:

• 7,000 thousand rubles to the supplier;
• 10,000 thousand rubles to Larisa;
• 2,000 thousand rubles fine to the bank.

This is how fraud can harm an inexperienced seller.

Why is it dangerous to miss a fraud?

The most significant losses occur in low-margin businesses. For example, with a sales margin of 2-3%, a merchant will need to sell a couple of dozen products in order to cover the losses incurred in one fraud operation. Remember that the main thing in such actions is that a high average check worsens the situation and creates new criteria for scammers. The most popular categories and industries for fraud operations are travel and retail sales of goods.

Fraud in the field of information technology is a large-scale organized business. Internet criminals unite into groups that carry out their fraudulent activities in every area.

Lawbreakers create their communities on social networks, on various forums, and do this with one goal - to improve their skills, collect general knowledge, share their experience and disseminate the most optimal attack patterns. All this helps online criminals gain maximum productivity and perfect unauthorized operations.

What types of fraud are there?

In 1999, F. Gosset and M. Hyland identified 6 types of this fraud:

1. Subscription fraud is a contract type, which is an incorrect indication of data when concluding contracts for subscription payments.
2. Stolen fraud - using a stolen phone.
3. Access fraud – reprogramming of telephone identification numbers.
4. Hacking fraud is the most common type. Illegal penetration into the security system of a computer network.
5. Technical fraud is a technical fraud that involves the production of illegal payment cards.
6. Procedural fraud is a procedural type that interferes with business processes.

How can you recognize fraud: suspicion of fraud

Suspicion of fraud is a way to prevent any unauthorized actions by scammers.

You can recognize it by various actions:

1. Loading speed is too fast.
2. Patterned user behavior (equal time intervals between transitions on the site).
3. The minimum time interval between clicking on an ad and purchasing.
4. Different locations for the same client.
5. Many clicks from one IP/ID.
6. The consumer's lifetime is a maximum of 3 days.
7. High activity at night.

How can a fraudster get your card details?

Common methods of intercepting personal data:

1. The buyer pays for a product or service on an unsecured and unverified site (an online store with a low level of security), and personal data is intercepted by violators.
2. The customer uses an ATM that has a skimming device. In this case, the person provides unlimited access to funds.
3. The consumer makes a purchase in an online store and pays for the goods with an electronic wallet using public Wi-Fi. After this, the fraudster gains access to all cards linked to the electronic wallet.

How to fight fraud

High-quality antifraud is a specialized service that is guaranteed to cope with all the manipulations of scammers, and does not allow you to cash out money or purchase products using someone else’s bank cards through an online store.