Another Fraud Ring Exposed

fly higher

fly higher

New member
Sep 21, 2009
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Long Island, New York
www.adfinity.com
Going through a pubs stats for a particular EDU offer I noticed something extremely fishy. I called him up and turns out he was using a service called Powersignups. This service filled out his affiliate links with "leads" for ridiculous rates. Which makes me wonder if they charged a decent amount if they'd come off a little less like complete fraudsters.

Here's the quick article I wrote about it w/ screenshots:
Fraud Ring Exposed: Powersignups|Adfinity.com Blog

Are there any more BS sites like these around the net? We really need to do something about this because it's killing our relationships. Fraud and selling accounts is one thing, but US publishers inadvertently signing up for these sites is a whole other issue that won't go away soon.
 


all the clicks and conversions come from the same ip on your screenshot.. good thing it was easy to spot this one..really hurts the industry
 
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You were right in flagging those leads due to the fact that they were all from one IP, however i think it is important that you know that there are several legitimate ppc companies out there (pm me f you want to know who) where 90% of the referer urls will be exactly the same yahoo emails, just like this place. And they are ppc. Secondly I think your conclusion by only signing up Americans is completely off target. As well as losing the opportunity of working with affiliates such like myself :) I can tell you that from my personal experience I have had affiliates from all over the world over the years and if we have to generalize after the Russians, the Americans are the most likely next nationality to game the system (imo) Just look at the arbitrage community which is 95% Americans. If you were really doing it right you would treat each and every affiliate who approaches you as an individual. You could then work with some of the best affiliates in the world (like the Brits, Canadians and Israelis)
 
fly higher said:
I don't know if pasting WHOIS information is allowed in here, but the website owner didn't take the liberty of using any whoisguard. And a reverse-ip search through domaintools brings up all his other websites. Just sayin'.
Click to expand...
Go post it in the network's section so other networks can fend of against it.

However, putting the service in the public probably wasn't a good idea with the new users WF has been attracting recently :/

Regardless, good post. +rep
 
Just a heads up that "Guaranteed" lead services have been around for quite some time now. Powersignups is just another flavour of that. Thankfully they're pretty easy to catch.

The unfortunate thing is that the affiliates who make use of these services actually think the service is legit and are quite shocked/troubled when they get the termination notice.
 
Good post, but I think it's short-sited to never allow any international publishers. There are definitely some countries to avoid, but to not let any international publishers will only hurt your business in the long run.
 
Booting out the pub is still ok. But imho not working with international
pubs is simply confining your business to a handful and keeping it
small. Fraud was there and will be there, its hard to keep it 100% clean.

But at the end of it all , thats what your job is. Take the best and leave the
rest.
 
Will it really kill lead gen though?
If anything it should put more emphasis on pay per sale instead, and perhaps this is something that should be suggested to the advertisers.
I've always found it amazingly frustrating that you can get a lead payout that's in excess of $50, but if you're doing a sale you're lucky to see $20... which is fucking moronic, because the sale is likely to turn out better for the advertiser than the lead.
 
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