PODCAST: The Big Story

Uncloaking A New Programmatic Scam

Friday, September 6th, 2024 – 11:01 am

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Behind every scam is someone with a deep understanding of the nuances (and loopholes) within a given system.

In one such operation, uncovered this year by invalid traffic monitoring company HUMAN, the scam cloaked traffic coming from piracy sites. Advertisers thought they were buying on a cryptocurrency news site, for example, but their ads were actually served while someone was pirating the latest superhero movie.

AdExchanger Senior Editor Anthony Vargas discusses what he learned from HUMAN about how the site operators carried out the scam (which included a very clever use of cookies) and how HUMAN stopped it. When you peel back the scheme’s layers, you get a deeper technical understanding of how digital advertising works.

AI agency assistants

Then, who doesn’t want AI to remove the drudgery from their tasks or make data digestible and actionable? Agencies like Omnicom and PMG are working on tools that help media planners, creative agency folks and strategists with tasks, such as audience planning. Could this AI tech transform agency work? AdExchanger Associate Editor Victoria McNally shares what this specialized tool can do and what sets it apart from a general tool like ChatGPT.

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