Who’s side is Google on?

 Unclear but they may have changed sides.
 
There have been many complaints and actions taken on click fraud by Google.

The search Giant makes almost all of its revenue thru adds on its adsense program and allegations over click fraud were hurting Googles image. Google initially had said it would use algorithms and other tools to ensure gross click fraud do not occur. Now Google is doing some simple actions to rectify the problem.

 Googles conflict of interest in all this is clear. Google in essence makes more money if there are more links. For them to admit or even take steps to rectify such a problem makes the most interested party the internet policeman. Nonetheless Google’s M.O. has always been improving the web experience of the user this would include the advertisers as well.

 Now Google has gone one step further.

 Google had said previously, if you clicked anywhere on an ad, including the background of the ad, that would constitute a click. Now, a user must click on the ad title or URL for it to constitute a click. This means that casual clicks won’t count only clicks on the URL or ad title. This is a proven tactic as Google already implemented this on its own search pages and now will expand to adsense not on its pages.

 We can all guess that the Adsense publishers won’t be thrilled with all this as they stand to lose money with less expected clicks. Google has countered that in the long run the publishers will make more money as potential advertisers will have more confidence in the system and advertise more.

Google for its part doesn’t seem to be losing money just making more as its stock now is at $642 a share.