Netflix is using technology disruption — SVOD or streaming video on demand. Netflix has acquired 50 million subscribers in the US over the past ten years. It has 100 million globally. The loss of conventional TV companies is not much, which means most consumer’s use both the services. Still, there is a shift towards new platforms such as Netflix and that is scary for conventional linear TV. The data adjusted for demographics is scarier — the younger audience has the most loss of viewership. Older citizens are actually watching more TV. Netflix spends heavily on content, except sports content. It will account for more than 20 per cent of global non-sport content spend. All this yields viewership.

In India, the situation is different. In the US, pay TV is expensive, and at $ 10 per month, Netflix is great value. In India, cable TV and DTH are cheap.

Here content is owned by the broadcaster and not the studio. Will the broadcasters licence the content to Netflix? It will take years to build a library of content. Even Internet access here in India is through wirless and mobile. A streaming business cannot be built on wireless broadband. In India, Netflix is not an immediate disruptor.

As you know, France is the birth place of films. They resist the business model of Netflix which finances less commercial  arty films. France wants a film to be released in theatres first, at least for three days, and then expects it to be released on internet. If a film is never shown in cinemas, is it still a film? Netflix disregard for releasing films in cinemas wins it few friends. Its comedy drama The Meyerowitz Stories got standing ovation at Cannes, and still there were cries of protest.

Netflix alone generates more revenue than the entire North American box office. Streaming wars began on April 2, 2010, a day when Netflix app appeared on Apple iPad. Soon it spread to fit into our pockets. It tied up with Star cable channel. It had access to thousands of films, including hits made by Disney. Soon at reasonable price, it became an alternative to cable TV.

Mergers of media companies followed. Murdoch sold off most of his companies to Disney. Many other companies on the lines of Netflix appeared after these mergers. All this cord-cutting and consolidation redefined the media landscape.

The erstwhile media moghuls are retiring. The road ahead is uncertain.

If there are leads generated because of a digital campaign, on verifying these, there could be detection of fraud. There is a lot of fraud in the digital ad industry, and so it is difficult to monetise it. There are instances of misalignment of incentives, overbiling and fake traffic. Ad frauds could be 10-30 per cent of all digital advertising done in India. The most common are the click fraud and bot fraud. Bots trick impressions and clicks. They mimic human behaviour. They mingle with the rest of the traffic. Yahoo India’s detection system identifies 20-40 per cent traffic on its tech platform as non-human traffic (NHT). It blocks its pre-bid, leaving less than 5 per cent NHT, as measured by third party vendors.

In mobiles, the frequency of fraud is higher. Fraudsters not only try to deliver and get paid for bot impressions, bot clicks, farmed leads, incentivised installs and fake customers. Human and machine farms drive installs and leads. It affects performance marketing. The marketer does not understand the cost of incentivesed installs or mobile apps.

Fraudsters follow the money. The highest CPMs are in video ads. Advertisers expect little measurable RoI from video ads. This makes a fraudster command a higher return, and remain under the radar.

Programmatic video accounts for more fraud than direct video in the US. India is still a nascent market for programmatic video.

The opportunities for an ad fraud arrive when marketers want results quickly.

Ad fraud can be countered by working with large reputed publishers and by using the right metrics.

The focus should be on buying viewable impressions and working with established publishers. While an advertiser is charged for the impression, it is not served in a humanly viewable space.

DSP platforms chosen must be right — e.g. The Trade Desk, Appnexus and Media Math. They ensure the efficient buys.

It also matters from where the inventory is sourced.. If the sources are non-identifiable, the possibilities of fraud increase.

Ad tech partners must convince the advertisers about their anti-fraud technology. There should be third-party verification and certification.

All modes of buying — impressions, clicks, conversions, views etc — are subject to fraud. There is SLVT or sophisticated invalid traffic. Advertisers have to use trusted third party tools to block all kinds of fraudulent inventory sources.

There are big content producers who are losing billions to pirate sites. In fact, pirate sites are earning money from advertisers in a way because ads end up showing on pirate sites as that is where they figure the audience is.

Digital fraud can be brought down to a single digit figure by brand safety companies. The technology exists to counter fraud

Programmatic has earned a bad reputation which is unfair. Automated buying is the logical way forward. Programmatic is about 10 per cent or less, but still there is fraud. Everything that can be bought programmatically will be. Advertisers have to learn to do it extremly well. In the US, after being talked about for years, programmatic finally realistically took two years to catch on. It will happen in India too. Publishers are probably worried about the yield from programmatic and so they hang on to what reserved media can offer to them. However, there will be a momentum that will tip the scale ultimately.

Publishers must respond to brand safety to get business from big brands.

Programmatic also adds several layers between the advertiser and the publisher. This empowers advertisers to be technologically efficient in reaching the audience. At the same time, it allows fraudsters to hide behind these several layers with very little risk of detection. However, it is incorrect to say all programmatic channels propagate fraud. There are reputed programmatic platforms that already have several tools to check fraudulent impressions such as MOAT, Double Verify and Forensiq.