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FTC Bars Popup Backdoor Ads
zanderredux was one of several readers to note that the FTC has banned backdoor popups. This is the result of the D Squared case that we've heard a bit about in the past. The case also restricted them from sending IM ads as well.
Evidence:
Every major browser now blocks the web variety (including IE, thanks to XP SP2). Microsoft also finally decided disabling Messenger and adding a firewall to their operating system was a good idea. Pity it took them so long to realise this.
And now, just for good measure, they're illegal too.
I say, good riddance.
Ads were "an annoyance you have to deal with in a free society," lawyer Anthony J. Dain is quoted as saying."
Just as removal of your kneecaps with a cold chisel is an annoyance you're going to have to deal with shyster.
I hate pop-ups. As far as I'm concerned unless I _specifically_ open up something I don't want it buzzing me. Pop-ups are YOUR code running on MY computer without my authorisation. Under different circumstances that is a good way towards describing a worm.
'Don't worry' said the trees when they saw the axe coming, 'The handle is one of us.'
His five-step procedure takes little time and zero bandwidth. XP SP2 requires you to:
1. Find a link to it (SP2Torrent.com is one, IIRC)
2. Download it
3. Install it
4. Reboot
5. Curse because something broke, or it hosed your system
6. Undo the damage (ranging from uninstalling SP2, to reinstalling Windows XP and all applications, and possibly recreating documents)
This is a fake victory for the FTC. First, the company (D Squared aka guilty slimeballs) who were doing this merely promissed not to do it again. Well, its a moot point anyway because Microsoft is closing the port/turrning off the service that allowed the ads in the first place. So they won't be able to send the ads anymore regardless of this "settlement". The guilty slimeballs do not have to pay any fines. So the message here is that despite the best efforts (? - not really) of the FTC, D Squared victimized hundreds of thousands of consumers and got away with absolutley no penalty and no admission of guilt. A real victory would have punished D Squared to the point of bankruptcy so as to deter future scum bags from exhotionate "business models"
Yeah! More government control! This is what we always wanted!
Yeah, yeah... we all know you got your computer and instantly turned off that "messenger" service, so for you it doesn't matter if everyone in the world wants to send you this sort of spam.
But guess what? Not everyone does. The average computer user still uses internet explorer and doesn't even know what "windows update" is, let alone how to use it.
Thus, laws must be made to protect the general populace. Remember, that you and I are *exceptions* within that group. I really don't think the government should be bashed just because they try to stop things that are a nuisance, or are considered morally wrong.
-nova20
Yes, I agree that is the main problem. If nobody actually bought any of their junk eventually they'd give up. Now if only someone could come up with a way to prevent the popup senders/spammers from getting stupid people to their websites...
The person who can make spam and popups unprofitable will become rich himself!
Urge to post... fading... fading... RISING!... fading... fading... gone.
Actually thats a good point, why is skipping adverts on TV 'not to be allowed' while ad skipping on the net is fine? Frankly i say fuck em both, when its my screen in my house, im afraid i have the last say about what goes on it - anyway, wtf are they gonna do about it? break down my door and demand i watch the adverts?
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
What always amazed me is the number of people who got these popups. Normal users, sure, that's understable. But I'd have friends that work in the tech dept getting these things, and complaining to ME about them.
I was even flamed a few times, on various internet forums, because I told people to, "Install a god damned firewall" to block these things. Not because of my tone, but because that obviously wouldn't work.
There are reasons why people use these tactics. There are enough idiots in the world that they work.
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
I don't mean to sound critical, but I cringe every time I see a post like this. If someone doesn't know how to start/stop services on their Windows machine, maybe they should take time out and learn the basics of their operating system instead of watching tv? Investing in a copy of something like Windows for Dummies wouldn't hurt, either.
IIRC, the recommended setting is 'manual' and not 'disabled' as Norton AV depends on the messenger service to issue its popup warnings. Either way, you may want to consider skipping the multi-step approach and try something a bit simpler next time:
C:\>net stop messenger
C:\>sc config messenger start= demand
Hmmm, what's the word I'm thinking of... Oh yeah... DUH! What I cannot believe is that marketing people think that popups are effective advertising!
I don't think this has any direct pertinence to the article but I just wanted to clarify the distinction between an advertising campaign and a marketing campaign.
An advertising campaign is used to promote awareness of some object or issue. A marketing campaign is used to elicit a (desired) response on the object or issue.
For example, a pop-up for Viagra appears and you close the pop-up turn to your wife and say "I don't need Viagra for the bedroom. They shouldn't waste my bandwidth with pop-ups." I would say as an advertising campaign, it was pretty successful. The company has put Viagra on your mind. As a marketing campaign, you might boycott the product resulting in a failure on the company's part.
In my mind, pop-ups are decent advertising tools. They aren't the best marketing tools but then again, I don't think the use and presentation of pop-ups have been effectively explored.
Hmmm... I think it's time to sit down and work on a business model.
I would argue that your computer screen is more like a window to the world. If you don't like what you see outside, pull the drapes. I don't mean to defend ads because I hate them. I will grant you that Messenger popup ads are a personal invasion. But then, there are enough tools, Firefox, AdBlock, Macintosh that keep me from dealing with them.
harmonious design
It's really not much of a contradiction. Imagine there's exactly one little shithole of a third-world country that refuses to adopt any U.S. laws. Then everyone there can spam us to oblivion, but the only way to escape U.S. patents is to live in that shithole country. And even if you did, you'd only have access to what the shithole country could produce internally, which would be mud and spam. :)
After all this time, I can't believe that the gummint hasn't figured that going after the PopUp merchants is a mugs game.
Go after the viagra retailers, fine them ten times what it would cost to print an ad, leave it to the local jurisdiction to collect, and they'll be gone in a day.
Destroy the market. Don't waste time and energy on the people trying to make a buck from it. Destroy the market...
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
I realize that this is going to be a really unpopular view, but hear me out.
My argument is that we institute legal processes to fix things only when we cannot fix them otherwise. For example, we have no way of keeping people from burning people's houses down, so we have the crime of "arson". If there was a simple spray for a house that made everything completely non-flammable, there'd be no reason to introduce the complexity and overhead of legalities.
The problem is that this is not an insoluable technical problem. (I don't think that *spam* is an insoluable technical problem either, but at least it's *harder* to solve.) It is very, very easy to stop boxes from ever popping up. Microsoft screwed up, and it'd be easy for them to provide a download from Windows Update that disables the Messenger service. Instead, they've chosen not to do so. This is an easy, easy fix. If people's computers were being *compromised* (so that by the time Microsoft's update came in, the computer was already controlled by a hacker, and nothing could be done), there would be a different issue. Pop-ups? Just disable the damned thing.
The same goes for instant messenger messages (though to a lesser extent). It is *extremely* difficult to try to slip ads past our existing messaging services, which are both (a) centralized, and (b) unencrypted. If IP Foo using account Bar is sending messages to a thousand different people in a day, something is very clearly quite dubious about that person.
I really, really, really do not think that the FTC should get involved. I can understand people being pissed off, but the person to be pissed off at is Microsoft in the case of Windows Messenger and the instant message provider in the case of the instant messaging. One of the fundamental things that you have to do when you design a system is make it reasonably unpromising to abusers. That was not done in either case. It's not something that requires intervention from the FTC (unless they want to make a statement about how people should complain to Microsoft/whatever instant messaging company is involved).
I could even see the FTC working with the industry to try to set up a mechanism for identifying people using their software that requires updates and notifying those people. But trying to stop advertising by going after one company at a time is pointless, and a waste of my tax dollars.
May we never see th
I own a corporation that I use to represent my personal assets and public actions. I own another that I use to represent a specific business enterprise I'm working on. I started a multinational corporation with some partners in the 1990s, achieved success, and sold it to them - after a couple of years of negotiation, then litigation, within the corporate/legal system. I have had corporate clients for 23 years, either as a contractor or employer, in dozens of different fields. I have worked with and against corporate executives, usually in a management analysis and business modelling capacity. In 5 US states and 3 foreign countries. My long expertise shows me that only defrauded shareholders typically find justice in the courts, and then only after a long process designed to shield corporate execs from any liability. That system yields far more settlements outside of court jurisdiction than actual justice. Compare that with the long arm of the law in sentencing humans - there really is no comparison. The corporation is a tool to avoid liability, otherwise unavailable to mere humans, unless they incorporate.
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make install -not war
Secure IE against ActiveX/JavaScript/VBScript/IFRAME exploits
Stop the 'unblockable' Messenger service
To further minimize the possibility of malware invading your system, use antivirus and firewall products. I use:
AVG antivirus by Grisoft.
Sysclean by Trend Micro
Outpost Firewall by Agnitum.
Filter spam/malware out of your email. I use CF13-POP3(TM). It is a freeware program I wrote to crush the email spam/malware menace. It is very effective.
A companion shareware program I wrote at the above URL is an all-in-one software mail server that makes it pratically impossible to accept and deliver email spam/malware.