wangarific

Jeremy at GenXFinance.com has been dealing with a vexing problem lately. A series of random websites with the cz.cc TLDs have been using his Google Adsense javascript code to pump up his impressions and driving down his clickthrough rate. Over four days there were nearly 600,000 impressions and zero clicks.

While it may seem a bit harmless (no click, no revenue right?), this is actually something that is quite dangerous. First, Google is always on the lookout for abnormal behavior and this certainly qualifies. Second, there are CPM based ads and in that case the advertiser would’ve been charged, Jeremy would’ve made money, and almost certainly booted.

In Jeremy’s case, it was probably harmless but this is something that can be completely avoided. Google Adsense gives you the ability to block your Adsense publisher ID from being used on any other sites. You can control this by logging into your account, clicking Adsense Setup, and then Allowed Sites.

Here, you can add all the allowed URLs who can load up your code. You always want to do this because there is little benefit, and a lot of risk, for unauthorized sites to use your code. They can do this by looking at your source code and copying the javascript code.

Just remember to add new sites if you put the code on them!