Anura PR Team
TL;DR
- Click injection is a type of mobile click fraud where fraudsters fake clicks to steal credit for installs or conversions.
- It exploits app broadcasts and latency to hijack attribution at the last second.
- This tactic leads to wasted ad spend, distorted performance metrics, and stolen commissions.
- It often targets affiliate campaigns, CPI/CPA ad networks, and mobile attribution platforms.
How Does Click Injection Fraud Work?
Click injection is a sophisticated mobile fraud technique where a malicious app listens for install broadcasts on Android devices. When it detects that a new app is being downloaded, it fires off a fake click just milliseconds before the installation completes. This tricks attribution platforms into believing the fraudster was responsible for the conversion—even though they contributed nothing to it.
Because the fraudster's click is the most recent, they get credit for the install and pocket the affiliate payout. It's a form of attribution hijacking, and it's difficult to detect using traditional click fraud filters.
Click injection typically targets:
- Cost-per-install (CPI) campaigns
- Mobile affiliate networks
- Performance marketing programs with weak fraud detection
What Are the Risks of Click Injection?
Click injection drains your ad budget and pollutes your performance data. You're paying for installs that were going to happen anyway—except now a fraudster is intercepting them.
This creates a false sense of campaign success, distorts ROI, and undermines legitimate partners. It can also trigger chargebacks, partner distrust, and reputation damage, especially if fraud isn't caught in time.
Worse, click injection fraud often coexists with other mobile threats like SDK spoofing and device farms, making it part of a much broader issue in mobile ad fraud.
How Can You Detect and Prevent Click Injection?
Traditional fraud filters often miss click injection because the fraudulent clicks come from real devices. Timing-based detection can help, but fraudsters are getting smarter—adjusting their injection windows to mimic legitimate behavior.
To stop click injection effectively, you need:
- Real-time traffic analysis
- Behavioral pattern recognition
- No reliance on rulesets or basic fingerprinting
That’s where Anura comes in.
Anura detects click injection by analyzing hundreds of behavioral and technical signals in real time—far beyond just timestamps or IPs. Our solution identifies bad traffic with 99.999% accuracy, ensuring fraudsters don’t get credit and your real partners are protected.
Why Mobile Campaigns Are Especially Vulnerable
Mobile environments offer more attack surfaces for click injection. Malicious apps can operate quietly in the background, and many app stores don’t catch these bad actors before damage is done. This creates a perfect storm for click fraud:
- High volume of installs
- Delayed attribution
- Inconsistent fraud protection
As mobile ad spend continues to rise, so does the incentive for fraudsters to exploit gaps like this. Anura helps close that gap—for good.
