Data from FouAnalytics, on-site measurement and in-ad measurement was compared to DBM exchange data for 26 exchanges, 7.5 trillion impressions (30 day period) to analyze browser market share -- specifically Safari/iOS. Findings include: 1) bots pretending to be Safari/iOS outnumber real Safari users 5 to 1, and 2) there is a 1.5X average surplus of Safari impressions available on exchanges compared to unique cookies.

1. December 2019 / Page 0marketing.scienceconsulting group, inc.
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GROUND TRUTH
Fake Safari vs Real Safari
December 2019
Augustine Fou, PhD.
acfou [at] mktsci.com
212. 203 .7239

2. December 2019 / Page 1marketing.scienceconsulting group, inc.
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Key Takeaways
• There are 5X more bots pretending to be Safari than actual human
users of Safari browser – confirmed humans’ Safari share was 3% while
confirmed bots’ Safari share was 16%
• There is also a surplus of Safari impressions on exchanges - Safari share
based on impressions (35%) was 1.5X the Safari share based on unique
cookies (24%)
• The two problems above – 5X more fake Safari users and 50% more fake
safari impressions – compound each other.
SO WHAT?
• If you see greater than 3% share of Safari in your digital programmatic
campaigns, you should investigate for ad fraud.

3. December 2019 / Page 2marketing.scienceconsulting group, inc.
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Browser share stats
by other public sources

4. December 2019 / Page 3marketing.scienceconsulting group, inc.
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Reported Safari Share Varies
Source: caniuse.com: 4.1%
Source: netmarketshare: 3.9%
Source: statcounter: 16.7%
Source: w3counter: 14.6%
Which is right?

5. December 2019 / Page 4marketing.scienceconsulting group, inc.
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Ground truth measurement
• Must be measured directly, on-site (code on page)
• Must be confirmed humans only, excluding bots
(bots significantly skew the results)
• Must be U.S. only - variations in browser share by
geographic location (country) are significant
• Exchange data combines Safari (desktop) and iOS
(mobile) into a single browser “Safari”
• Browser share represents overall percentages
without separation of desktop versus mobile

6. December 2019 / Page 5marketing.scienceconsulting group, inc.
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On-Site Measurement
Humans vs Bots
Data Source: FouAnalytics

7. December 2019 / Page 6marketing.scienceconsulting group, inc.
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Confirmed HUMANS Browser Share
25%
26%
25%
3%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
Publisher
1
Publisher
2
Publisher
3
Publisher
4
Publisher
5
Publisher
6
Publisher
7
Publisher
8
Publisher
9
Publisher
10
Publisher
11
Publisher
12
Publisher
13
Publisher
14
Publisher
15
AVERAGE
Safari
iOS Browser
Unknown
Samsung Browser
IE
Firefox
Edge
Chrome
Android Browser
Comparison: caniuse.com: 4.1%
Comparison: netmarketshare: 3.9%
Safari (3%)
Data Source: FouAnalytics, 15 publishers, 50 sites
AVERAGE

8. December 2019 / Page 7marketing.scienceconsulting group, inc.
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Confirmed BOTS Browser Share
Safari (16%)
7%
38%
10%
16%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
Publisher
1
Publisher
2
Publisher
3
Publisher
4
Publisher
5
Publisher
6
Publisher
7
Publisher
8
Publisher
9
Publisher
10
Publisher
11
Publisher
12
Publisher
13
Publisher
14
Publisher
15
AVERAGE
Safari
iOS Browser
Unknown
Samsung Browser
IE
Firefox
Edge
Chrome
Android Browser
Comparison: statcounter: 16.7%
Comparison : w3counter: 14.6%
Data Source: FouAnalytics, 15 publishers, 50 sites
AVERAGE

9. December 2019 / Page 8marketing.scienceconsulting group, inc.
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Bots prefer to be …
Formula: Bot Browser Share ÷ Human Browser Share
Android BrowserChrome Edge Firefox IE Samsung BrowserUnknown iOS BrowserSafari
Publisher 1 0.2 3.2 0.8 6.4 7.3 0.0 0.1 0.2 1.4
Publisher 2 0.0 0.1 0.0 0.2 - 0.4 24.6
Publisher 3 0.4 0.5 0.1 2.8 0.4 51.0 0.7 2.0
Publisher 4 0.3 0.7 - 5.7 0.4 1.2 12.8
Publisher 5 0.2 2.6 0.6 1.4 14.0 0.0 0.6 0.3 4.1
Publisher 6 0.0 2.6 0.1 0.3 1.0 - 0.1 0.1 0.6
Publisher 7 0.3 3.2 1.2 6.6 11.8 0.2 0.4 0.9 25.4
Publisher 8 0.1 0.8 0.7 15.2 0.1 0.2 3.5
Publisher 9 0.3 2.2 0.4 9.5 10.2 0.6 0.5 0.3 9.5
Publisher 10 0.1 1.5 0.9 3.4 3.8 0.0 0.2 0.4 1.4
Publisher 11 0.1 1.4 0.7 0.6 7.4 - 1.1 0.3 3.8
Publisher 12 0.4 2.5 0.7 3.5 31.3 0.4 0.3 0.2 3.1
Publisher 13 0.1 3.6 2.4 4.8 17.3 0.1 0.1 0.9 4.3
Publisher 14 0.3 2.1 0.7 1.3 3.7 0.4 0.7 0.6 10.5
Publisher 15 1.9 0.5 0.4 0.5 11.3 0.2 0.2 0.1 1.0
AVERAGE 0.3 1.5 0.5 2.8 8.5 0.2 0.4 0.4 5.1
Safari bots are
5.1X overstated
“In some cases, Safari was 10 – 20X overstated”

10. December 2019 / Page 9marketing.scienceconsulting group, inc.
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Bots pretending to be Safari browsers are
5X higher than humans using Safari,
based on data from 15 publishers (50
sites), directly measured by FouAnalytics.

11. December 2019 / Page 10marketing.scienceconsulting group, inc.
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Exchange Browser Share
Data Source: DBM, Last 30 Days, U.S. Only

12. December 2019 / Page 11marketing.scienceconsulting group, inc.
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Share by Unique Cookie
66%
22%
10%
50%
26%
43%
2%
41%
34%
12%
21%
35%
3%
34%
31%
47%
30%
23%
10%
17%
5%
34%
15%
25%
8%
22%
14%
24%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
By Unique Cookie
Safari
Unknown
Opera
Mobile
IE
Firefox
Edge
Chrome
Android
Safari + iOS
Data Source: DBM, Last 30 Days, U.S. Only

13. December 2019 / Page 12marketing.scienceconsulting group, inc.
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Share by Impressions
47%
46%
32%
70%
33%
26%
32%
47%
15%
25%
38%
62%
15%
39%
22%
39%
45%
17%
32%
23%
33%
51%
15%
47%
52%
15%
28%
35%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
By Impressions
Safari
Unknown
Opera
Mobile
IE
Firefox
Edge
Chrome
Android
Safari + iOS
Data Source: DBM, Last 30 Days, U.S. Only

14. December 2019 / Page 13marketing.scienceconsulting group, inc.
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Impressions vs Unique Cookies
Formula: Impressions Share ÷ Unique Cookies Share
Safari imps are
1.5X overstated
Android Chrome Edge Firefox IE Mobile Opera Unknown Safari
Exch 1 1.5 0.6 1.2 5.3 0.6 0.8 0.4 1.6 2.1
Exch 2 0.4 0.6 1.2 7.0 0.7 0.8 1.4 3.2 3.1
Exch 3 0.8 0.6 0.1 1.0 0.2 1.0 0.2 0.7 1.4
Exch 4 0.8 0.8 1.5 4.2 0.7 4.7 1.1 1.6 1.3
Exch 5 0.4 1.5 1.7 2.3 0.7 0.5 1.3 0.3 0.6
Exch 6 1.1 0.5 0.4 23.5 0.8 0.9 0.8 18.7
Exch 7 0.7 0.9 0.8 5.1 0.3 0.8 0.6 0.5 1.1
Exch 8 5.8 0.7 0.3 3.1 0.1 9.9 0.4 0.3 0.4
Exch 9 1.0 0.8 1.1 4.6 0.6 0.8 1.1 1.2 2.0
Exch 10 0.5 0.7 1.3 6.7 0.7 0.7 1.3 2.8 1.8
Exch 11 0.5 0.6 0.5 7.0 1.0 1.5 0.9 0.8 1.8
Exch 12 5.9 0.3 0.4 7.3 0.5 5.4 0.4 6.0
Exch 13 0.8 0.8 1.5 5.9 0.7 1.2 1.5 3.6 1.1
Exch 14 0.8 1.0 2.2 7.3 1.3 0.7 1.8 4.4 0.7
Exch 15 0.3 1.2 1.9 20.4 1.1 1.0 3.9 5.1 0.8
Exch 16 0.7 0.7 1.1 8.0 0.5 0.8 1.3 3.6 1.5
Exch 17 0.5 1.0 0.7 5.4 4.3 1.1 1.4 2.3 0.8
Exch 18 0.8 0.7 1.1 10.3 0.8 1.1 1.2 2.9 3.0
Exch 19 3.2 0.6 1.5 17.0 1.0 4.9 2.0 1.8 1.4
Exch 20 0.9 0.7 0.7 4.7 0.6 0.5 7.1
Exch 21 0.7 0.7 1.1 9.3 0.6 1.2 0.6 1.6 1.5
Exch 22 3.5 0.7 1.2 12.3 0.9 4.9 2.3 2.7 1.0
Exch 23 0.6 0.7 0.9 13.7 0.5 0.3 0.0 3.7 1.9
Exch 24 0.4 0.5 0.6 11.3 0.7 1.1 1.7 21.5 6.2
Exch 25 0.3 0.9 1.2 6.5 0.8 0.3 1.7 2.6 0.7
Exch 26 0.7 0.6 1.4 9.1 0.8 7.4 0.8 2.6 2.0
AVERAGE 1.4 0.7 1.1 7.6 0.8 4.2 1.0 1.3 1.5

15. December 2019 / Page 14marketing.scienceconsulting group, inc.
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Analysis of data from 26 exchanges (7.5
trillion potential impressions, 30 day
period) shows 1.5X more impressions
share than unique cookies share.

16. December 2019 / Page 15marketing.scienceconsulting group, inc.
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Corroboration
How do we know the data is reliable?

17. December 2019 / Page 16marketing.scienceconsulting group, inc.
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In-Ad and On-Site vs Exchange
52%
42% 43% 46% 50%
63%
68%
35%
41%
47%
41%
35%
28% 24%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
IN-AD 1 IN-AD 2 IN-AD 3 IN-AD AVERAGE AVERAGE by
Impressions
ON-SITE AVERAGE AVERAGE By Cookie
Safari
Unknown
Samsung Browser
IE
Firefox
Edge
Chrome
On-SiteIn-Ad
• In-Ad measurement corroborates average by impressions
• On-Site measurement corroborates avg by unique cookie

18. December 2019 / Page 17marketing.scienceconsulting group, inc.
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Measurement Notes
• Browser share by our in-ad measurement
correlates well to exchange data browser
share by impressions (measures ads)
• Browser share by our on-site measurement
correlates well to exchange data browser
share by unique cookies (measures users)
• This gives us confidence that the data is
reliable and usable because it is corroborated
across different data sets.

19. December 2019 / Page 18marketing.scienceconsulting group, inc.
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Recap
• There are 5X more Safari bots than actual
human users of Safari
• There is a 1.5X average surplus of Safari
impressions on exchanges
• Bots have a motive to pretend to be Safari
and iOS because they can get higher bids
(buyers believe iOS/Safari users are affluent,
desirable target audience)

20. December 2019 / Page 19marketing.scienceconsulting group, inc.
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Who am I?
• I am a digital marketer of 23+ years
• I look at analytics data every day
• I audit campaigns for fraud and other
bad sh*t that lowers performance
• I teach clients how to spot fraud and
make optimizations to improve
outcomes

21. December 2019 / Page 20marketing.scienceconsulting group, inc.
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FouAnalytics
Site
Analytics
Media
Analytics
“see fou yourself”
• alternative to Google Analytics
• secure, hardened against attack
• shows all details, no black box
• innovated w/ practitioners
• verify your own media/ads
• fraud detection baked-in
• shows details for decisioning
• recommended optimizations
for #publishers for #marketers