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Belkin Routers Route Users to Censorware Ad

Posted by jamie on from the happy-birthday-megan dept.

The Register has a story today about Belkin routers redirecting their users' network traffic. To me, this seems like the logical next step after top-level domain name servers piping ads to your browser. Now the routers themselves hijack the traffic they are supposed to, uh, route -- and you'll love where they send you instead. But it's OK because you can opt out. Incidentally, the Crystal Ball Award goes to Seth Finkelstein, who in 2001 quoted John Gilmore's famous aphorism about the internet, and asked "What if censorship is in the router?"

7 of 805 comments (clear)

  1. Here's the angle I would take... by pegr · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The device is defective. Make product support give you one that works. While you're at it, send hate mail to the marketing team. I bet the support guy will give you the right email addresses...

    Better yet, get the addresses and post them here.

    1. Re:Here's the angle I would take... by Hypocritical+Guy · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I'll just quit buying Belkin products. Though I don't have any to beginning.

      --
      If you liked licking my balls, add me to your foes list!
    2. Re:Here's the angle I would take... by shane_rimmer · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I don't know how you feel about Netgear, but they are another option.

  2. Some other ideas... by L-Train8 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    What's next? Will the phone you buy occasionaly redirect your call to a telemarketer? Will your TV remote automatically switch channels to an infomercial? Maybe your car radio could redirect your listening to a clear channel station every
    8 hours. These are business models I need to patent...

    --

    Don't forget that Friday is Hawaiian shirt day.
  3. Re:I could see this coming by jayhawk88 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    IHBT...

    Bullshit. Slashdot is bombarding me with ads because I'm a cheap bastard and refuse to pay them for the content they provide me. Belkin's got the money I gave them for their router, they don't need to be sending me ads I don't want to see to make more money.

  4. Belkin can modify your router settings? by extrarice · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I found this quote from Eric Deming in response to the original newsgroup posting quite interesting...

    [quote]
    By the way, this procedure (disabling the nagware in the router web-config) might have to be done if your router is behind a firewall. Reason: filter.belkin.com sends a response to the Router to set the flag. [/quote]

    So Belkin deliberately left a configuration on the router to be modifiable by someone without proper authorization (the owner of the router or the network admin)? Absolute genius. Destroy your company's reputation 100% in one easy step: the backdoor(s) will piss of the geeks, and the nagware-advertising will piss off Joe Sixpack.

    --
    "Jesus saves, but everyone else in a 10 foot radius takes full damage from the fireball."
  5. Re:Exactly by Bleck · · Score: 5, Insightful

    My fear there -- so now, when I click on a link and get re-directed to some arbitrary site, I'm supposed to click the "click here if you're not interested" link? Haven't we spent the last thousand posts making fun of users who fall for that?

    --Tom