Online ad scam

A group that hunts for online advertising fraud said a Russian criminal group has made millions of dollars by fooling ad buyers into believing hundreds of thousands of people were watching ads. The firm, White Ops, says the scam used made it look like people in the U.S. were watching real video ads from actual companies on some 6,000 fake websites that imitated well-known publishers like ESPN and the New York Times. White Ops says that since early October, the group may have been making $3 million to $5 million a day from companies that pay for digital ads.