Google makes nearly $500 million a year because of domain typos

If you ever end up at Panodra.com instead of Pandora.com, you may be putting a few extra pennies into Google’s piggy bank. That’s because of typosquatting, the deliberate registration of a popular domain’s misspelling. Knowing that people often make typos when going to websites – like spelling “Panodra” when they’re looking for “Pandora” – enterprising schemers will register the typo version of a popular website and fill that page with links that pay money for impressions or clicks. The domain owner makes money and Google gets a piece of the action as well.

A Harvard University professor and research fellow have estimated that Google could make as much as $497 million dollars a year through typosquatting. The two men reached that conclusion by creating a list of possible typos for more than 3,000 popular websites, finding 280 possible misspellings for each site. They then found that 60 percent of typosquatters use Google’s advertising program to make money. Google is able to generate that money because more than 68 million people visit typo sites each day.

Typosquatting is a practice that is several years old but still controversial. Domain owners don’t like squatters taking advantage of their potential visitors, and advertisers worry that they will be paying to advertise to people who are confused or disinterested in their product. (Pandora is a music streaming site but ads on Panodra lead to shopping and dating sites).

Google says that it removes ads from typo domains if the original trademark holder files a complaint. The company is currently dealing with a lawsuit over its ads appearing on domain parkers. I wonder how much of their $23 billion advertising revenue goes toward legal fees.

Read [The New Scientist]