App Developers Sued by Facebook for Click Injection Fraud

After Facebook has been on the receiving end of numerous lawsuits, they are now suing two Android app developers, accusing them of click injection fraud.

Click Injection is attribution fraud, where the culprit uses an app on the user’s device to listen to install broadcasts. The fraudulent tricksters are informed when new apps are installed on the device, which triggers a “click” before the install is complete – allowing the fraudster to take credit for the install. In the end, advertisers pay commission to the publishers who had nothing to do with promoting the app. 

The app developers LionMobi and JediMobi, located in Hong Kong and Singapore respectively, were allegedly distributing apps for Android devices that use click injection fraud.   

This is not the first time that a developer has been caught doing this, as the Chinese developer Cheetah Mobile was caught doing so last year. Click Injection is one of the more common forms of ad fraud, and is not only seen within the users of Facebook. 

LionMobi and JediMobi have both since been banned from Facebook’s ad network, and the advertisers affected by this were justly compensated.  

Story via The Hacker News and AppsFlyer.com