Google on Friday announced it purchased spider.io, a 3-year-old company that will provide ad fraud-fighting technology to the search giant.
"Our immediate priority is to include their fraud detection technology in our video and display ads products, where they will complement our existing efforts," Neal Mohan, vice president of display advertising at Google, wrote in a blog post. Mohan added that Google hoped to improve its ad metrics over time to give advertisers a clearer assessment of how their campaigns are doing.
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Google didn't disclose terms of the deal. Given Spider.io's size — the company has just seven employees — it's more of an aqui-hire.
Spider.io, which is based in London, was founded in 2010 by Douglas de Jager, who had previously cofounded another company called Byteplay, which was acquired by Zoopla. Spider.io made a name for itself in March 2013 when it identified a botnet called Chameleon that it claimed cost advertisers $6 million in revenues. Such botnets work by simulating clicks. Advertisers, who think the clicks are real, are charged anyway.