Originally Posted by RawAlex

1) If the average Zango detection rate is, say, 1%, and you have some affiliates that have 10% in their referals, you have something to look at, especially if your ToS says "no toolbar traffic". Programs need to pay much more attention to the sources of their traffic.

2) Zango can't fake "from" information, as that would be a violation of their support of the Truste protocols. Attempts to hide themselves would give an indication that they have something to hide. A nice letter writing campaign to the FTC would follow.

As for links from emails, well.. do you support spam?

3) Programs need to keep the ToS up to date.

4) If you can spot even 10% of what goes through your program and try to teach them, it would likely be enough to tilt the numbers against the malware companies.

5) Velocity tracking on clicks is very important. One thing your affiliate program should pride itself on is not losing track of the surfer, and having an interface that doesn't allow the affiliate code to change on the fly. Cradle to grave tracking is an important thing, so that affiliate codes can't be replaced on the signup page, as an example. Going back and rematching join page hits with signups and looking at IP and other browser indicators is a good way to assure this isn't happening.