That is a great response and true. What these researchers are proposing does not match the usual meaning of click fraud. Though the harms it causes are simila

That is a great response and true. What these researchers are proposing does not match the usual meaning of click fraud. Though the harms it causes are similar: * advertiser is paying for clicks/impressions from a bot rather than a user * publisher/network sending lower quality traffic to advertiser faces reputation and financial risk Likewise, depending on the situation fake social media profiles also can harm the quality of said network. In terms of damages caused by the researchers' action... clicks would be the most harmful. Especially against insurance, loans, and mortgages which they seem to be interested in. Those have some of the highest CPCs around. (e.g. http://www.wordstream.com/articles/most-expensive-keywords http://www.wordstream.com/articles/most-expensive-keywords)