Vube: 14.5M uniques in USA? #71 site in the world? Stats manipulation?

[notlisted]

I check the Alexa top sites index once in a while to discover newly booming sites. Yesterday I came across Vube.com, which is presently listed on Alexa as the #133 site in the US, and #71 site in the world. Surprising, since I'd never heard of them. Compete states 14.5MM monthly users in the USA.

Vube is a song cover contest site which lists videos, allows users to vote, and awards prizes to the winners.

Video view counts shown are through the roof (millions), even for videos that were posted 2 years ago on youtube (e.g. Thinkin Bout You - Frank Ocean Cover by Emmalyn, 10.8mm on vube in 4 months, nearly 3MM on youtube in 2 years)

Looking at the Alexa upstream sites [1], I see 10% of their traffic stems from adcash.com and various other advertising-related sites are represented in that list as well.

Is it really so easy to manipulate these stats? Did I miss a popular trend?

[1] http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/vube.com

[wmaiouiru]

I see pop up ads from Vube for some sites. I think that is why their visits are being inflated.

Also it seems like a lot of browsers are getting infected with virus that opens up Vube: http://malwaretips.com/blogs/remove-vube-virus/

[notlisted → wmaiouiru]

Ah, that explains. Since posting the question I found similar comments online ( e.g. http://www.webutation.net/go/review/vube.com and http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20130729083625AA... fourth answer)

Still amazed that one can manipulate stats that much.

[ecspike]

They popup ads on some popular bit torrent sites that are named for political parties in Europe. ;)

That might explain the hidden stats.

[ibudiallo]

Views are inflated because those videos pop under and start playing in the background.