The Apollo operation represents a complex ad fraud scheme that exploited the expanding audio ad market, which is projected to exceed $2 billion in programmatic spending by 2025. Revealed by HUMAN and The Trade Desk, Apollo generated 400 million fraudulent bid requests per day, mimicking legitimate ad traffic and taking advantage of vulnerabilities in server-side ad insertion technology. Fraudsters effectively exploited the limited telemetry of SSAI to impersonate legitimate inventory, even using malware-infected devices to further obscure their operations. This case highlights the significant risks associated with new advertising technologies.
Apollo operated an intricate scheme that simulated real audio ad traffic, exposing vulnerabilities in server-side ad insertion technology and resulting in 400 million fraudulent bid requests daily.
The fraudsters exploited the limitations in telemetry provided by SSAI, replicating legitimate ad request patterns to generate fake audio ad inventory, including apps that wouldn’t normally serve audio advertisements.
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