A coupon code can leak mainly because of browser extensions. If one user applies a valid coupon code at checkout, and this user has a browser extension installed, then the code become available for all users. Secondly, all coupon code websites use advanced scrapping techniques to get coupons: they monitor your newsletters, banners, ads, social media, and their own competitors, to get a full list of valid coupon codes.

Some brands could say that coupon leak is not a problem, as it will drive more customers and more sales. This is mainly a wrong approach. Only very few coupon websites have their own community and traffic. Most of them just get traffic from SEO and users leaving the Shopify checkout to hunt for codes. Consequently, when a coupon code leaks, you don't get more new customers. You just offer free discounts to existing ones - and you might also pay unfair affiliate commissions.

In 2021, Mastercard has estimated the coupon code abuse at 90B$ in the US only. People use multiple accounts to benefit from discounts and opportunistically hunt for codes while at checkout.

By replacing coupon codes by links, we get the incoming traffic and user experience under control. We can check where does the user come from, if he is a legitimate user and authorized to redeem the discount. We use advanced tracking techniques, behavioral analysis and fraud detection to prevent any unwanted user to benefit from a given promotion.