Click Settlement

Hi all,

Does anyone know about the click settlement for the class action lawsuit of google?

Is it real or spam?

Do you think I should make a claim?

Thanks,
Travis

Yeah, I would like to know that as well. I got several emails about that. Seems to be spam but I don't know how they got several email addresses that I use for my Google PPC accounts. Anyone with knowledge on this?

Here's the Email:

This court-ordered notice may affect your legal rights. Please read it carefully. If you purchased online advertising from Google between January 1, 2002 and the present, you are a class member in a class-action lawsuit in the Circuit Court of Miller County, Arkansas. This notice is to inform you of the Court’s certification of a class; the nature of the claims alleged; your right to participate in, or exclude yourself from, the class; a proposed settlement; and how you can claim an award of advertising credits under the settlement. Please read the attached notice.

You can get more information at: www.clicksettlement.com.

I called the 800 number and read through some stuff and it seems that there was a lawsuit against Google for not doing enough to stop click fraud. Rahter than going to trial, Google settled on a $90 million settlement. Around the middle of this month, judges will determine how much of that goes to lawyer and court fees and then the rest will be distributed to Ad Words customers. You have to go to clicksettlement.com between June 19th - August 4th to fill out some form that will only be available then. Depending on your PPC account, you will be credited some Ad Words credits for future use. Not sure how to determine how much. Sounds like basically if you want, fill out the form and you'll find out. They are pretty vague about how much you'll be credited.

If you go to the site there is a pretty easy to read FAQ PDF that you can download. It explains it all better and it's a short read.

Anyone know any more than this?

The claim form asks you to estimate what percentage of your ads were affected by click fraud. The question I have is, "how can you know?"

Google talked about the pending settlement in their Official Google Blog back in March. I don't see any new posts on the subject.

An AP article posted on the Miami Herald site last Wednesday June 28 titled Yahoo Settles Class Action Law-suit on Click Fraud indicates that the settlement in the Google case is not yet final.

There is additional information on the Yahoo lawsuit in an e-commerce times article.

Here's an updated article from a law digest I subscribe to:

[link]

Google 'Click Fraud' Settlement Criticized
The National Law Journal

More than 40 online advertisers alleging that the nation's top search engines conspired to overcharge them have filed objections aimed at unraveling a $90 million settlement with Google. The class action alleges that Google and others charged two advertisers for fraudulent clicks in pay-per-click advertising programs. Objectors say the proposed settlement is unfair, in part because they will receive only 10 percent of a $60 million fund. They're also not happy about the size of the attorney fees.

so does anyone know the answer to completenovice's question? How do you know what to answer when they ask what percentage of your clicks you think were fradulant?

BizReport article Judge OKs Click Fraud Settlement

So basically (if this article is accurate) $4.50 refund on every $1,000 spent in its advertising network during the past 4 1/4 years.

you can get a semi accurate figure from adwords now, if you run a campaign (not a keyword) you have the option to include the amount and percentage of all fraud clicks.

this isn't very accurate because this is fraud clicks that Google have detected and only works for this year