Across my 25 years working in AdTech, MarTech, and research industries, I’ve seen firsthand what happens when incentives outpace protections…fraud moves in fast.

Whether it’s ad impressions that never truly reach a human eye, leads that don’t actually exist, or survey scams—fraud distorts data across channels. And if left unchecked, it erodes trust between buyers and brands, creating a lot of waste in its path.

As fraud has matured in the research space, fraud detection has evolved too. With checks like identity verification, behavioral monitoring, and even AI-powered oversight (a bit meta, isn’t it?)—Dscout is going toe-to-toe with imposters.

We’ve long invested in systems to guard against fraud, fake responses, and low-effort engagement—because when folks rely on human insights to drive decisions, quality isn't optional.

How Dscout protects research

We built Dscout to help researchers, designers, and product teams connect with real people—thoughtful, authentic participants who show up with care.

To ensure that our participants are who they say they are, we weave quality checks into every part of the process:

• Well-designed screeners and video questions that help customers hand-pick participants.
• Built-in checks to detect fraud, bots, and low-effort submissions.
• A vetted and engaged panel of Scouts ready to meet our high quality standards.
  

Because teams can’t build the right products without hearing from the right people.

Transparency and control, from the start

Every Scout (participants in the Dscout proprietary panel) builds a full profile—name, email, photo, demographics, and we use first-party verification to make sure teams know who they’re hearing from.

With Dscout’s Recruit tool, customers can:

• Screen, shortlist, and hand-pick participants.
• See full profiles and videos before inviting anyone.
• Ensure strong alignment and accountability from day one.

They have the control to review and choose each participant to fill their study with real, engaged, people in their desired market.

Our safeguards in action

Whether customers are launching a mission or wrapping up analysis, our built-in protections are working behind the scenes—and often right up front—to keep data reliable and research safe.

Our multi-layered protections kick in early and stay active:

• Device and behavior checks: Catching suspicious activity like duplicate accounts or GPS inconsistencies.
  
• Effort detection: Identifying low-effort or AI-generated submissions before they reach the project.
  
• Ongoing monitoring: Reviewing behavior patterns to detect and address fraud quickly.
  

And where automation stops, humans step in for manual moderation.

Dedicated team members review every flagged submission that makes it through the automated controls, in continuous efforts to improve the panel and identify new automated measures.

At Dscout, the important work of protecting research integrity is both foundational and never finished!

“I'd say where Dscout is different is the quality of the participants we get and the ease doing the type of research we need to do.

Dscout has proven its value where we're actually trying to go from insight to action and involving real customers in that process.”

‍Brian Graziano
Director of User Experience at a prominent health organization in the U.S.