An Article By Kaytay Reprinted with her permission

How to Avoid "Click Fraud"

By kaytay, eHow Member Rating

Rate: (15 Ratings)

Click Fraud is against eHow policy, not to mention illegal and selfishly unfair. If you do not know what click fraud is, you definitely want to read this article and protect yourself.

Step1
Click fraud refers to clicking on ads simply for the sake of earning money from the click. It is considered an internet crime to click on an advertisement for the purpose of generating a charge per click without having any interest in the ad's link.
Step2
eHow writers get paid based on the ads generated from their article when someone clicks on a particular ad. Unfortunately, people are falsely clicking on ads to boost their own earnings. I can't emphasize enough that this is illegal and in some states, considered a felony.
Step3
I have seen IM's stating that xyz person read, rated, and commented on an article and also clicked on a few ads. These people may have good intentions trying to help out a fellow eHow writer, but what it is actually doing is falsely stealing from the company paying for that ad. This is robbing that company of their hard earned advertising money and wasting their advertising dollars. If you are unsure how pay per click advertising works, consider this. A company allots x amount of money towards a specific ad. They pay a predetermined amount each time a web user clicks on that ad. Usually the company sets a maximum amount they will spend on that ad. As people click on the ad, they are charged for the click, and their overall allotted amount steadily decreases until it is depleted. Once the money budgeted for that ad is gone, the ad is removed. So think about this. If someone is fraudulently clicking on their ad, that company has no chance of earning any money from that supposed interested prospective customer. Again, click fraud is the same as theft. It is illegal and fraudulent clickers can be charged with a felony.