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I've never believed click fraud was running in the +30% range and now Elinor Mills has details of a new report that suggests it's actually less than 14%.

The Click Fraud Index shows that the overall, industry-wide average click fraud rate is 13.7 percent. The click fraud rate at top-tier search engines such as Google and Yahoo is even less, at 12.1 percent, the data show. The rate rises to 21.3 percent at so-called Tier 2 search providers and 29.8 percent at Tier 3 search companies, according to the Index.

With this report being carried out by Click Fraud Network, a company that offers click fraud monitoring services, the numbers may still be inflated. After all, they're tracking the data of advertisers that believe they are victims of click fraud. If we included an equal sample of regular advertisers, the rate would likely be lower.

Any way you dice it, it proves that click fraud is a manageable issue. While it's nice to see a report like this, I still believe we need a non-biased audit.

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Andy Beal is an internet marketing consultant and considered one of the world's most respected and interactive search engine marketing experts. Andy has worked with many Fortune 1000 companies such as Motorola, CitiFinancial, Lowes, Alaska Air, DeWALT, NBC and Experian.

You can read his internet marketing blog at Marketing Pilgrim and reach him at andy.beal@gmail.com.