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A study of click fraud by Fair Isaac found 10 to 15 percent of ad traffic is "pathological," and is more of a problem than companies like Google and Yahoo want to admit.

Fair Isaac Enters Click Fraud Debate

The whiff of click fraud has the potential to erode the multi-billion dollar revenue streams that big online ad providers like Google and Yahoo generate. It's a big part of the reason why they have looked at third-party claims from firms like Click Forensics so negatively.

Tom Cuthbert, Click Forensics president, has a little more ammunition to play with, now that Fair Isaac has found in its research since August 2006 that the figures cited in their study mirror those from Click Forensics.

A report in the Globe and Mail noted how Fair Isaac found a significant percentage of questionable traffic in its study. That "pathological" traffic as cited by Fair Isaac's Joseph Milana likely means click fraud is taking place.

Both Google and Yahoo have taken issue with third party click fraud claims before, as they claim their systems throw out illicit clicks before they ever impact an advertiser's account. Google has even said they detect all but about 0.02 percent of the click fraud affecting their AdWords clients.