I spent a long time researching just this. Below are some if not...

I spent a long time researching just this. Below are some if not all the things I understand about how TrafficGuard won't be affected.

The push towards more privacy-focussed browsing environments is likely to exacerbate the problem of ad fraud in my. Opinion .
The advertising industry has been calling out for greater transparency, which is in direct contrast to the privacy-focussed direction browsers and operating systems are moving. Eliminating cookies and other identifiers like IDFA reduce visibility and make it easier for fraud to pretend it's human.


In mobile app advertising, the function of attribution is going to be significantly impacted by Apple retiring its IDFA in iOS 14 -

This is like Christmas come early for fraudsters and shit news for marketers. Fraudsters will be looking forward to taking advantage of this new smokescreen of cover which will see some of their most rudimentary click spam tactics being rewarded by misattribution.


What this actually means imo :

A smoke and mirrors scenario for Fraudsters.

Less standardisation in mobile campaign management and measurement which may introduce new vulnerabilities for Fraudsters to take advantage of.

Consolidation in traffic sources but don’t let that trick you. Just because some backyard network can’t run an iOS campaign, they will still likely feature in the chain as a traffic source to one of the hundreds of networks that Apple has verified.

This just means people have less choice and potentially higher media prices as less ad networks are able to compete in iOS traffic and you could propbably assume Apple verified ad networks look to acquire their un verified competitors to increase their market share.... Makes sense no?

Attribution is only based around the last-click which is prone to ad fraud


With all of these things, the importance of ad fraud prevention drastically increases... How can't it?
Particularly at the the time of someone clicking the add with no visibility into Apple’s attribution. This can significantly reduce the chance of misattribution by removing invalid clicks from the pool for attribution in real time. This is not great.


All of this will only increase fraud if you ask me.


New tactics emerge based on vulnerabilities that emerge as businesses try new methods to manage and measure their app advertising. Fraudsters will always try find a way around this ... Let's be honest.

There is likely to also be an increase in click spam to take advantage of the reduced transparency and Apple’s last click attribution. This really increases the importance of fraud prevention at the click because by removing invalid clicks, you reduce the opportunity for misattribution.

MMPs are stomping their feet and shouting for good reason. This disrupts their primary function of finding the single source to attribute each conversion to.


The primary function of measurement and verification isn’t reliant on the IDFA. Traffic guard uses from memory 180 data points it creates from the click as indicators to measure and verify advertising traffic.

From my research and understanding they don't perform attribution,

They verify traffic to reduce the pool of clicks available for attribution, and then traffic guard verify attribution. This can all be achieved without an IDFA.