Abnormal Click-to-Install Times
Unusually fast or suspiciously uniform time gaps between ad click and install completion often indicate click injection or automated scripts.
Fraud Type Guide
Install Fraud: What It Is and How to Protect Your Campaigns
Install fraud drains CPI budgets by generating fake app downloads that never convert. Understand how it works and what you can do about it.
What Is Install Fraud?
Quick answer: Install fraud is the generation of fake app installations to claim fraudulent attribution credit. Also known as app install fraud.
Install fraud occurs when fraudsters fabricate mobile app installations to steal cost-per-install (CPI) payouts from advertisers. Techniques range from device farms running real devices at scale, to SDK spoofing that simulates installs without any device involvement, to click injection that hijacks organic installs at the last moment.
The result is the same in every case: advertisers pay for installs that bring zero genuine users into their app. Campaign analytics become unreliable, attribution models break down, and budgets flow toward fraudulent sources instead of channels that deliver real engagement.
For a comprehensive breakdown of every install fraud technique and how each one is detected, read the complete app install fraud guide.
Quick Tips to Spot Install Fraud
Watch for these warning signs across your mobile acquisition campaigns.
Install Spikes Without Engagement
High install volumes with near-zero post-install activity (no sessions, no in-app events) suggest bot-driven or farm-generated installs.
Geographic Anomalies
Clusters of installs from regions you do not target, or mismatches between IP geolocation and device locale settings, are strong fraud indicators.
Duplicate Device Fingerprints
Multiple installs sharing identical device parameters or resetting advertising IDs at high frequency point to device farms recycling hardware.
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