White Friday (as known in the Middle East region) is one of the high-growth periods for brands as consumer intent peaks; competition intensifies, and digital storefronts battle for attention across marketplaces, apps, and social platforms. Users aren’t just browsing; they’re ready to act, which means every click, every install, and every new registration matters.
To capture this surge, brands often scale up their affiliate campaigns to reach as many new users as possible.
In 2024, over 25% of White Friday sales in the MENA region were attributed to affiliate platforms and stores, underscoring how crucial the affiliate marketing channel has become for driving app installs, user sign-ups, and purchases.
However, while this model promises measurable results, it also comes with greater risks.
While the advertisers race to capitalize this high sale season during White Friday with affiliate partnerships, some are ready to exploit it. Some affiliates resort to manipulative tactics that distort data, steal attribution credit for organic users, and drain budgets.
Therefore, it becomes time-critical for brands in the MENA region to validate their ad traffic coming from affiliate marketing, to ensure that every click, install, and interaction results in positive outcomes.
How Affiliate Fraud Spikes During White Friday Sales in MENA
The sales skyrocket during White Friday and fraudulent affiliates use this as an opportunity to deploy fake traffic, device emulators, and various affiliate fraud techniques to mimic real users and claim payouts.
Industry data reveals global mobile app install fraud exposure surged 157% to reach $5.4 billion, with bots driving over 70% of this activity. In the MENA region alone, affiliate and install fraud exposure was estimated at $65 million in 2023, impacting categories like travel, finance, and shopping apps.
Here are some of the sophisticated forms of ad fraud techniques used by affiliates to manipulate campaign results:
1. Click Injection
Fraudsters generate fake clicks seconds before a legitimate app install, hijacking attribution from genuine users.
2. Incent Fraud
Where fraudulent affiliates run ads on incent walls to drive traffic and encourage them to take action against a reward. Usually, in this case, the traffic is genuine but low intent. They uninstall the app once they have claimed the reward, and the brand has to pay double to acquire new users.
3. Click Spamming
It is when fraud affiliates generate a large number of fake clicks in the background of a mobile ad to manipulate attribution systems, steal credits for genuine user installs and falsely claim payouts.
4. Coupon Fraud
Affiliates often misuse promo codes, run fake or unapproved offers under the legit brand name to inflate conversion numbers and earn payouts.
5. Device Farms
Virtual devices simulate installs and in-app activity, creating the illusion of organic user growth.
6. SDK Spoofing
SDK spoofing is another sophisticated method of ad fraud where fraudsters imitate legitimate app install signals by manipulating the SDK’s communication with attribution platforms. This tricks systems into recording fake installs, inflating metrics, and wasting ad spend.
These fraudulent signals blend effortlessly with legitimate traffic, making detection far more difficult.
The consequences are immediate and costly – affecting marketing ROI.
Brands end up paying for fake users instead of real customers, losing not just money, but also the data integrity needed for smarter campaign decisions. And during White Friday, the problem intensifies because the higher the spend, the deeper the loss.
Yet, much of MENA’s affiliate ecosystem still operates on trust-based relationships and loosely vetted publisher networks, leaving brands vulnerable to hidden fraud patterns that traditional ad fraud solutions fail to catch.
How Affiliate Fraud Impacts Business Growth During White Friday Sales
When affiliate fraud goes undetected, it affects more than just numbers; it directly impacts your budget, performance, and long-term growth. Here’s how:
- Wasted ad spend – You unknowingly end up paying for fake clicks, fake installs, or in-app actions that never come from real users.
- Low user quality – Techniques like incent fraud bring in users who install the app but don’t stay or engage, leading to quick drop-offs and poor LTV.
- False performance reports – Affiliate fraud makes campaigns look profitable on paper, even when they’re not delivering real results.
- Wrong partner credit – Genuine affiliates lose recognition, while fraudulent ones get paid for work they didn’t do ethically. This also makes it difficult for marketers to figure out where to invest for real growth.
- Compromised retargeting budgets – Advertisers end up running re-engagement campaigns for fake users by feeding wrong data to the algorithms, wasting budget on audiences that don’t exist.
Understand the real impact of ad fraud on MENA brands in detail here.
Why Detection Using Attribution Platforms Isn’t Enough: The Need for Advanced App Traffic Validation
Marketers still rely on attribution platforms and analytics tools to detect suspicious activity and affiliate fraud. However, they often ignore the fact that fraudsters have now become smarter and use multi-layered techniques to manipulate campaign data, fake results, and earn payouts.
Fraudsters now use automation, spoofed devices, and fabricated user signals to mimic legitimate user behaviour so closely that they pass through standard detection filters unnoticed.
So, what marketers need now is not another fraud alert or detection system; they need a proactive ad traffic validation solution. Because validation helps restore what detection alone cannot — trust.
Here’s how advanced ad traffic validation and affiliate fraud detection tools add real value to affiliate campaigns:
- Validates every click, install, and post-install event to confirm they come from real users, ensuring the right partner receives credit.
- Identifies fraudulent activity like click injection, click spamming, or SDK spoofing that often go undetected in attribution dashboards.
- Helps remove misleading traffic signals from future campaigns, giving marketers a clear and reliable view of performance.
- Helps advertisers optimize spend by directing budgets toward affiliates driving authentic, high-quality installs.
- With validated insights, brands can make confident optimization decisions backed by trusted data.
- Transparent, validated reporting builds accountability between brands, publishers, and partners.
To explore in detail why attribution tools alone can’t stop mobile ad fraud – read this blog.
How mFilterIt Helps Brands in MENA Region Restore Trust in Affiliate Campaigns
App traffic validation is the missing link between tracking app installs and attributing those installs to a source. At mFilterIt, we help brands bridge the gap by using an independent app traffic validation solution – Valid8 to ensure every click, install, and in-app event is verified, and every dollar is moved towards genuine partnerships.
Here’s how our ad fraud solution helps detect affiliate fraud and restore trust in affiliate marketing:
1. End to End Traffic Validation
Our tool verifies each user’s journey, from the first click to the final in-app event, ensuring every install comes from a genuine source. This helps eliminate fake installs, incent-driven actions, and bot activity before they impact your results.
2. Source Level Transparency
The solution provides clear visibility into which affiliates and sub-publishers are delivering authentic traffic. By knowing exactly where users are coming from, brands can easily identify trusted partners and weed out poor-quality sources and fraudulent partnerships.
3. Detection of Sophisticated Fraud Tactics
Valid8’s advanced algorithms detect hidden forms of ad fraud such as click spamming, click injection, SDK spoofing, and emulator-based installs, etc., protecting campaigns from even the most complex affiliate fraud techniques that often slip past traditional detection tools.
4. Behavioral Pattern Analysis
Beyond installs, mFilterIt tracks real user behavior, monitoring actions like session length, navigation, and event completion. This helps distinguish between genuine engagement from automated engagement, bot-like interactions that mimic real users.
5. CTIT (Click to Install Time) Analysis
By analyzing the time between a user’s click and install, our ad fraud solution detects anomalies that indicate fraud, such as instant installs or unusually delayed attributions, offering another reliable layer of protection against manipulation.
6. Smarter Budget Optimization
Clean, validated data enables marketers to reallocate spend toward affiliates and channels that drive high-quality, converting users. This not only reduces wastage but also enhances campaign efficiency and return on ad spend (ROAS).
Conclusion: Winning White Friday with Confidence and Clarity
As White Friday approaches, every click, install, and conversion counts – but only when it’s real. In a market as competitive and fast-moving as MENA, advertisers need to be extra vigilant to ensure the partners they rely on for measurable results are truly reliable.
Because during high-spend events like White Friday, even a small percentage of fraudulent traffic can distort your data, drain your ad spend, and damage long-term growth. Affiliate marketing thrives on trust, and once that trust is broken, every campaign’s insight becomes uncertain.
That’s why leading brands in MENA are shifting from detection to validation to combat affiliate fraud.
Gain confidence in your affiliate campaigns with mFilterIt’s ad fraud detection solution and turn every interaction into real performance.
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