ANZ Ad Fraud Rate Increases By 14% According To DoubleVerify’s 8th Annual Global Insights Report

Australia – [June 19, 2024] – DoubleVerify ("DV"), the leading software platform for digital media measurement, data, and analytics, today released its DV Global Insights: 2024 Trends Report. The report employs DV technology to comprehensively analyse media quality and performance trends from more than one trillion impressions from over 2,000 brands across APAC, EMEA, LATAM, and North America. It delves into critical industry topics, including the expansive role of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in transforming media and advertising risks and opportunities, the rapid increase in Made for Advertising (MFA) content, the rise of Retail Media Networks (RMNs) with specialised inventory, and how responsible media buying contributes to reducing carbon emissions.

The accompanying DV Global Insights: 2024 APAC Report found that ANZ overall fraud rate increased 14% to reach 1.3% — the second-worst in fraud rate in APAC. During the same period, ANZ brand suitability violations fell 46% to reach 5.4%. ANZ viewability rates remain relatively stable year-over-year, with the video viewability rate of 75% on par with the global benchmark.

Globally, a 23% surge in new fraud schemes and variants compared to the previous year was reported, and unprotected advertisers saw a fraud/SIVT (Sophisticated Invalid Traffic) violation rate as high as 17%. These violations include incidents of bot fraud, site fraud, app fraud, hijacked devices, data centre traffic and injected ad events, all of which illegitimately inflate online advertising impressions or data events to generate revenue. Generative AI was found to be a key factor for the increase — due to the ease with which it can falsify data patterns.

The report also highlights the growing global importance of attention-based measurement in advertising, particularly as cookies phase out and the demand for more transparent metrics increases. In 2023, advertisers increasingly prioritised attention metrics, with 47% of media buyers planning to integrate these metrics into their strategies in 2024.

Retail media networks were reported as being over-index for media quality in terms of brand suitability and ad fraud, with fraud rates nearly one-third (31%) lower than the DV overall fraud benchmark and brand suitability violations lower by 10% than the DV overall brand suitability benchmark.

DV’s analysis also showed a 19% year-over-year increase in MFA impression volume in 2023. The growth was primarily driven by a 73% increase in “Low-tier” MFA impressions, which appear on hybrid sites that include a mix of MFA and non-MFA characteristics. The report notes that while MFAs may appear high-performing when looking at specific isolated KPIs, such as clicks and viewability, MFA sites deliver 7% less overall attention on display ads and 28% less on video than other media.

Further APAC findings from the study include:

58% of APAC media buyers say responsible investment frameworks have had significant positive impact on media quality

• 58% of APAC marketers spend more than 20% of their workweek manually optimising digital media campaigns;
• 60% of APAC marketers think AI-driven campaign optimisation will have the most significant positive impact on media quality

The DV Global Insights: 2024 Trends Report covers video and display impressions from January to December 2023 across desktop, mobile web, mobile app, and connected TV (CTV) insights. It also incorporates a global survey conducted by Sapio Research which polled 1,000 advertisers globally regarding the impact Generative AI has on the online digital ecosystem. It found that 57% of the advertisers surveyed view misinformation spread by AI-generated content as a key challenge for the digital ecosystem, 54% believe Generative AI has negatively impacted media quality, and 50% believe an increase in MFA and low-quality content was “the biggest threat” to the digital ad ecosystem.

Mark Zagorski, CEO of DoubleVerify commented: "It’s no surprise that advertisers are concerned. Gen AI has incredible potential for the ad industry in areas like creative development and media optimisation, but it can also be weaponised against it. Ultimately, brands need dynamic tools to help them safeguard investments and maximise campaign performance."

About DoubleVerify

DoubleVerify (“DV”) (NYSE: DV) is the industry’s leading media effectiveness platform that leverages AI to drive superior outcomes for global brands. By creating more effective, transparent ad transactions, DV strengthens the digital advertising ecosystem, ensuring a fair value exchange between buyers and sellers of digital media.

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