Chinese click fraud gang in Thailand arrested
Chinese click fraud gang using huge numbers of phones to boost page views & cheat advertisers in China, arrested on immigration charges.
Chinese click fraud gang using huge numbers of phones to boost page views & cheat advertisers in China, arrested on immigration charges.
FRAUD, ADVERTISING & THE WEB
Click fraud gang from China: Phone bots to boost page views
12/06/2017
Online Reporters
SA KAEO - Three Chinese nationals using phone bots to falsely boost page views on websites were arrested when police raided a rented house in Aranyaprathet district.
They were arrested on charges including working without work permits.
There were hunded of smartphones racked on metal frames and connected to computer monitors.
A search found thousands of unused SIM cards.
The police raid followed a tip-off that illegal migrants were living there.
The Chinese nationals Wang Dong, 33, and Niu Bang, 25, were detained when immigration police searched their house in tambon Ban Mai Nong Sai.
During the raid another Chinese man, Ni Wenjin, 32, walked in. He lived next door. A subsequent search of this house also found a large number of SIM cards.(continues below).
Large numbers of SIM cards are also seized. [photo by Thai News Agency]
CLICK FRAUD: HIRED TO INCREASE PAGE VIEWS OF PRODUCTS
Speaking through an Chinese interpreter, Mr Ni said they were not running a call-centre scam, a police initially suspected.
They had been hired to increase page views of products, and had been doing it for three months.
The hundreds of smartphones were used as bots to falsely increase readership numbers of the pages.
Racks of mobile phones used in click fraud.
CLICK FRAUD APPARENTLY LEGAL (UNLIKE CALL CENTRE FRAUD)
This is, in fact, another kind of scam called a "click fraud" scam that is apparently not illegal in Thailand since the Chinese were not charged with violating any Thai law related to click fraud.
Click fraud is the practice of hiring people to click thousands of times on a web page or web advertisement so that advertisers are deceived into thinking that a lot of people are visiting the page or viewing the advertisement, so that they will pay more for advertising on the page (see here).
Pile of sim cards to use in click fraud (Source: Facebook).
USE OF THAILAND AS A BASE FOR CLICK FRAUD IN CHINA
There were a total of 500 phones were arrayed on a rack using fake accounts on WeChat, China's largest messaging app. to boost likes and page views for online advertisements in China.
The fraudsters used Thailand because in China only one phone can be linked to a single WeChat account, presumably to prevent click fraud (see here)
NO FRAUD CHARGES, BUT MANY OTHER CHARGES
The suspects were charged with overstaying their visas, working without work permits and using unregistered SIM cards.
They were then handed over to Aranyaprathet police.
The seized phones, mostly iPhones, would be examined to determine if they were smuggled or properly taxed, police said.
The suspects could face a charge of smuggling.
Click fraudsters after arrest (Source: Facebook)
http://www.bangkokpost.com/news/crime/1267055/gang-used-smartphone-bots-to-boost-page-views
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Click_fraud
http://www.khaosodenglish.com/news/business/2017/06/12/chinese-likes-farmers-arrested-thai-border-town/
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