Decentralized video platform Theta Labs is collaborating with smart contract giant Chainlink to fight the estimated $19 billion global issue of online video ad fraud, according to a release shared with CryptoSlate.Fight ad fraudAs per its website, Theta is a decentralized video delivery network with its own blockchain that is specifically designed for incentivizing the sharing of bandwidth.The firm notes that today’s content delivery networks (CDN) lack reach, causing video re-buffering, and high load times in many parts of the world. Skyrocketing data needs means users demand 4k, 8k, and higher quality streams create infrastructure bottleneck.However, their centralized nature means less revenue flows back to content creators and platforms. In addition, the massive presence of click-farms and bots means malicious content creators manipulate the data to their own benefit.Reports show the above is an international issue and set to grow to over $44 billion by 2022, as per estimates, unless firms and regulations stop that.But Theta has a solution. The brand’s new partnership with Chainlink will be the first blockchain-based approach to reduce digital ad fraud and increase the effectiveness of each ad dollar spent.The solution, which is currently live on TestNet, uses Google’s Big Data solution, BigQuery, to process video performance data generated on the Theta Network and create a reputation score for each streamer based on their viewership, the release noted.How Chainlink oracles helpChainlink oracles then broadcast the reputation scores to the Ethereum blockchain where they are stored as immutable records for online advertisers to reference when deciding where to allocate capital.For the uninitiated, oracles are a third-party service that fetch data from “outside” a blockchain to within. This is required because blockchains are only a store of value and cannot validate the authenticity of the input data, meaning that while blockchain may indefinitely store data, it may not necessarily be correct. Chainlink changes that.Theta is one in a long list of crypto companies this year to have chosen Chainlink’s oracle services. The latter has announced newer partnerships and onboarding for its oracle tools nearly every other day, and its adoption doesn’t seem to be stalling any time soon.The Chainlink “Linkies” are arguably thrilled.
