THE NEWS WRAP: Yahoo! acquires Israeli ad security startup for undisclosed amount

Yahoo! has acquired Israel-based advertising startup Clarity Ray.

The startup raised $500,000 about two years ago, when it was offering tools for online publishers to circumvent ad blockers, but has since shifted its focus from ad blocking to ad security and fraud detection.

Yahoo! confirmed the acquisition to TechCrunch, but the terms of the deal are unknown.

In a statement on its website, Clarity Ray says its vision is to make “the eco-system safe, compliant and sustainable for consumers, publishers and advertisers”.

“This once-in-a-lifetime opportunity enables the mass scaling of our technology, impact and ideas to the absolute forefront of our field, while working with an amazing team who shares our passion,” the statement says.

Twitter experiments

A sizeable number of users are seeing tweets favorited by others in their timeline, just like retweets, in an experiment that is annoying a lot of people, according to The Next Web.

Those users are also getting notifications when others follow someone new.

Washington Post now inserting Amazon affiliate links into news articles

The Washington Post, which is owned by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, is now including “buy it now” buttons wedged into its online book reviews, as well as on news items and letters to the editor.

The button links to related content available for purchase on Amazon.

Overnight

The Dow Jones Industrial Average is down 50.67 to 16,662.91. The Australian dollar is currently trading at US93 cents.