Is Clicksor a Scam?

Clicksor is an advertising network company based in Richmond Hill (Toronto suburb), Ontario, Canada. According to its website, Clicksor is a ‘sister company of YesUp Ecommerce Solutions Inc.’ We don’t know exactly how many advertisers and publishers they have.

The question of whether Clicksor is a scam perhaps depends on who you ask and who wants to answer the question. Interestingly, if you ask Google about ‘Clicksor scam,’ you will get a number of hits. (See Screenshot 01.) If you want us to answer this question, our simple reply is, yes. So let us explain why we think Clicksor is a scam.

Screenshot 01 – Source: Google

Screenshot 02 – Source: MacHouse

Screenshot 03 – Source: MacHouse

If you visited our website at www.mhvt.net back in June and July (2008), you may have seen a yellow green (728 x 90) ad at the top. (See Screenshot 02). Yes. We have tested their ad network. As shown in this screenshot, it caused a small problem on this website. ‘Learn more’ appears at the top. It wasn’t a big issue. But we decided to remove their ad codes.

There was another problem. Soon after using their ad codes, they started to deliver porn ads to our websites. (See Screenshot 03.) We asked them not to, and their response was that our particular post concerning fake PornTube website triggered the delivery of those porn ads. (See Screenshot 04-5.) However, we didn’t buy their definition of porn or pornography. We don’t support pornographic content here. If you go to their Terms and Conditions page, they even use the phrase ‘child pornography.’ (See Screenshot 06.) With its own definition, Clicksor is also a porn website. They eventually screened out sensual phrases for our account. Once we had advertisers for video tutorials and Adobe-related websites, as shown in Screenshot 02. After they screened out sensual phrases, those advertisers were gone.

Screenshot 04 – Source: MacHouse

Screenshot 05 – Source: MacHouse

Screenshot 06 – Source: Clicksor

We then heard from Sales Director at Clicksor. Ms. Poon agreed to create a new account for us in response to our request. (See Screenshot 07-8.) Using a new account, we hoped those advertisers for video tutorials and Adobe-related websites would be back. The outstanding ad revenue at our old account was about US$10. We were worried that they wouldn’t transfer our earning. But Mr. Poon noted in her e-mail message of July 5 that she had asked their accounting department to transfer our ad revenue from our old account to the new one. (See Screenshot 09.)

Screenshot 07 – Source: MacHouse

Screenshot 08 – Source: MacHouse

Screenshot 09 – Source: MacHouse

Unfortunately, switching accounts hasn’t helped. Actually, it created a new problem. We did NOT enable their inline text ad when we tested our new account. But its label showed up at the top of the page. Once again, we were obliged to remove their ad codes. (See Screenshot 10.)

Screenshot 10 – Source: MacHouse

Screenshot 11 – Source: Clicksor

Screenshot 12 – Source: MacHouse

We were willing to use Clicksor’s ad network. But their system is simply incompatible with our websites. Then they started sending e-mail messages with the subject lines of Publisher Quality Control Announcement and Reminder of Account Earnings. (See Screenshot 11-2.) They say that publishers who haven’t earned more than $50 will be kicked out of their ad network. Honestly, there is nothing that we can do on our side so that we can use their system. We have used more than 10 ad networks where we never had problems. We reminded Ms. Poon that their accounting department had failed to transfer our ad revenue despite her promise. (See Screenshot 13-4) However, she hasn’t replied.

Screenshot 13 – Source: MacHouse

Screenshot 14 – Source: Clicksor

Finally, let us answer the initial question once again. Yes. Clicksor is a scam. We displayed their ads. And they’ve confiscated our ad revenue. There is no word better than ‘scam’ that describes their business practice.






References:

Video Documentation: Clicksor – Porn Text Ads and Inline Text Ad Problem
Beware of WWW.1URL.IN: Systematic Redirection to Malicious Websites (3)