Fighting Click Fraud And Bots From The Heart Of Texas

It's been a big year for Click Forensics, a company that helps advertisers, agencies, and ad networks recognize and reduce low-quality Web traffic. In addition to naming a new CEO and securing second-round funding, the fraud-fighting startup struck a deal with Google.Click Forensics is one of many innovative tech startups based in Austin, the capital of Texas and live music capital of the world. InformationWeek's Startup City recently traveled to Austin to meet with a handful of local companies. Check out our Startup City goes to Austin trailer below.

In March, Click Forensics announced that it closed $10 million in second-round funding from Austin Ventures and Shasta Ventures. At the same time, Paul Pellman, a former executive VP of marketing with Hoover's, took over as CEO. I met with Paul on our Austin road trip, and you can see the interview below.

Over the past six months, Click Forensics has struck deals to provide its pay-per-click intelligence and technology to ad networks (Ad Chap, Ad Juggler, Bravenet Media, Broadspring, eZanga, FindItQuick.com, and Turn) and search engine companies, including LookSmart, MIVA, and, notably, Google. The deal with Google was a breakthrough, since Google had raised questions over click-fraud statistics generated by Click Forensics and other online ad auditors. Click Forensics uses its data to create a quarterly Click Fraud Index. According to the company, the click'fraud rate across the Web was 16% in the third quarter of 2008, compared with 16.2% the previous quarter. Botnets were responsible for 27.6% of click fraud in the third quarter, up from 25.2% the previous quarter.

Here's my interview with CEO Paul Pellman.