#mobileadfraud

Bots are becoming sophisticated and more human-like every passing day. And with the emergence of AI, it is becoming a dominant force for shaping online traffic.  

According to Imperva BadBot Report 2025, 51% of the internet traffic is driven by bots, which is further amplifying with the introduction of AI and LLM. Unlike the basic bot traffic showing abnormal signs like high number of clicks/installs etc., the sophisticated bots can mimic human behaviour, therefore bypassing the validation checks.   

Mobile app advertising is all about data coming from CPI campaigns – ROAS and LTV being the go-to metrics to measure campaign performance and success. But are you sure the metrics you are relying on are giving you the right results? 

The numbers on your dashboard are not always true.  

As advertisers pour more budget into mobile performance campaigns, many overlook critical vulnerabilities – mobile ad fraud. It’s not just a line-item loss, it’s a performance killer that inflates Return on Ad Spend (ROAS) and erodes Customer Lifetime Value (LTV). 

Fraudsters exploit the systems marketers depend on – attribution models and campaign metrics – using sophisticated tactics like click fraud, fake installs, click injection, SDK spoofing, etc.  

Advertising platforms optimize for signals—not intent.  

In mobile marketing, the most important signal is the install. More installs usually mean a campaign is working. Platforms see this, assume success, and push more budget in the same direction.  

This is where install fraud begins.  

Fake installs are easier and cheaper to generate than real users. Fraudsters use bots, device farms, or incentivized tactics to create large volumes of installs that look genuine on the surface. Since the numbers look good, platforms assume the campaign is performing well. Budgets increase. The same sources get more spend.

You feel confident to spend more on these campaigns.

On your dashboard there are 200 people, but upon deeper analysis you see that only a few retain as users. That’s a sign that something is not right. It’s not the usual invalid traffic, but a more advanced and difficult version of ad fraud. Referral and coupon fraud are advanced types of mobile ad fraud which impacts the action driven KPI’s and can skew your data.

Behind every “successful” campaign report, there’s a silent leak which the bundled MMP fraud filters often miss. From install hijacking masked as organic growth to sophisticated bot farms mimicking real user behaviour, fraud today is engineered to look clean in your MMP dashboard. And that’s precisely the problem. 

MMPs were built to measure, not to mitigate. Their bundled fraud detection tools are designed to keep attribution accurate, not to uncover the nuanced, evolving fraud patterns that drain budgets and distort growth metrics. Yet many app marketers rely solely on them, believing their campaigns are fully protected, while hidden fraud continues to erode ROI in the background. 

You launch a referral program with the intention to acquire new users to your app. When analysing your campaign progress, you see that your referral champion is a single user who somehow ‘invited 200 people overnight’.   

You feel confident to spend more on these campaigns.

On your dashboard there are 200 people, but upon deeper analysis you see that only a few retain as users. That’s a sign that something is not right. It’s not the usual invalid traffic, but a more advanced and difficult version of ad fraud. Referral and coupon fraud are advanced types of mobile ad fraud which impacts the action driven KPI’s and can skew your data

One of the common pain points our clients have expressed is that their number of installs doesn’t match the number of conversions. They see a high volume of installs happening, but this doesn’t convert into outcomes.  

There is not just one reason behind an unusual spike in installs. It can be bots, or something more advanced which a human eye might miss easily. In one of a recent campaign data we evaluated, we observed that a new and unusual technique is used to hide invalid traffic driving fake app installs from Android mobile versions.  

In the sections ahead, we’ll break down how fraudsters are hiding their trails by spoofing device related information – like mobile app versions and why it matters more than you think. 

Every performance marketer running a user acquisition campaign has the same goal – to increase the number of app installs and lower CPI. But often, the post-install metrics don’t match what campaign dashboards show.

Despite high marketing spends, performance looks inflated and unpredictable. The numbers eventually stop making sense due to low engagement and poor retention. And this usually means one thing: you’re acquiring installs, but not real users.

This gap between installs and engagement clearly indicates mobile ad fraud – deceptive tactics used to manipulate mobile advertising campaigns and post-install metrics. A threat that eats into budgets even before marketers notice.

That is why, while chasing installs, it is also important for marketers to ensure those installs are not the work of bots, click farms, or devices mimicking real behaviour, but real active users