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OpenDNS Says Google-Dell Browser Tool is Spyware
PetManimal writes "David Ulevitch, the founder of OpenDNS, claims that Google and Dell have placed 'spyware' on Dell computers. Ulevitch made the claim based on his observation of the behavior of the Google Toolbar and homepage that comes preinstalled on IE in new Dell machines. He says that a browser redirector sends users who enter nonexistent URLs to a Dell-branded page loaded with Google ads. Another observer, Danny Sullivan, says that this is a different result than what happens on PCs without the redirector. However, the original article notes that Ulevitch has a vested interest in the results of mistyped URLs."
Now I work for a fortune 500 company and guess what we do with every box we get from Dell? Re-image it.
Now, for the 99% other Dell customers, this is just purely unfortunate because I'm not so naive to expect everyone to know how or why they should take the above actions. I hope that all the virus scanning apps (HiJackThis, Lavasoft's Adaware, etc) get this thing because Adaware is about the most useful thing I can show my family how to use frequently enough to keep the computer protected.
This sounds a lot like something the old Gateways would do. Huh, I never would have thought Dell would reach that level but, well, here we are. The important thing is to factor this in when you're thinking about a new computer. Hopefully some competition will spring up for Dell and, you know, quality of the software (not just the hardware) will start to matter for Dell.
My work here is dung.
This seems like junk that Dell have installed to make some cash one the side. If firefox bundled the same dns hijacker then who would you blame? Firefox or google?
Just because google make the tool doesn't mean its their fault that it is installed by default in a spywareish fashion.
... the first thing I do for my clients is either clean up all that crap or reinstall the OS (depending on which one will be faster and cheaper for them). I doubt Dell installs this kind of sh!t (and all that other crapware) on the computers their employees use ... Google probably doesn't either.
Google is a publicly traded company and as such here's what's important to them.....
Making money for their stockholders.
That means doing things like creating spyware if it helps their bottom line. The mantra of "Do no evil" becomes null and void once you become a publicly traded company. They should change their motto to "We do less evil than everyone else".
Google is going to do what is best in their corporate interest. Surprised? Don't be. It's business
The issue here is that Google / Dell beat OpenDNS to the punch. Both accomplish the same purpose: when a user types a malformed URL into the address bar, they get an "enhanced" experience.
OpenDNS is bummed that Google figured out a way to make money off the proposition. OpenDNS should have thought of that first.
To Copy from One is Plagiarism; To Copy from Many is Research.
Dell is "monetizing" mistyped URL traffic, like OpenDNS. The customer has a choice which DNS server he uses and which preinstalled software he gets with a new computer (by choosing different vendors). Both do the same, for the same purpose. If I had to choose between the two, I'd choose Dell. At least they don't fly under a false flag, like OpenDNS, which only claims to be Open for marketing purposes.
http://www.iwebtool.com/domain_lookup?domain=www.g oogle.com
Age of domain 9 year(s), 9 month(s) and 9 day(s) - Online since: 15-Sep-1997
P.S. Roll your monitor 180 degrees.
... Or at least _not only_ The same behaviour happens on my company issued Dell D820. It comes loaded with IE6 and NO Google toolbar and yet when I mistype a URL I do not end up at the MSN search page like on any other IE installation! Instead IE redirects me to a Dell branded Google search page full of Google commercials.
I'm sure slashdot denizens will have a good time discussing how useless the bundled software and trialware that comes with Dell computers is, and how the sensible thing to do is reinstall from scratch, but that's been the case for a while. There is zero story here.
The fact that it sends you to a custom page if you make a URL typo does not mean it is spyware. That's a visible change, and you would be hard-pressed not to notice the effects of the software, or the fact that it sends you to a Dell branded page.
Since Dell ships it to you that way, you have no meaningful opportunity to establish an expectation that the Dell system behave differently. I.E. Since the software "comes that way" for you, it's not as if the software made a change to your computer without your permission.
So not only is it not spyware, it's not malware, or software that secretly modified your system without authorization (because, you see, your system came that way in the first place).
Google is beholden to capitalism. No longer a private organization, its board can be sued for making decisions that negatively impact the value of the stock.
Google's motto should now be "Don't be evil, unless it increases our stock price."
Face it geeks, your idols have jumped the shark.
When I got broadband from Charter they changed my 404 settings to go to some Charter-specific search page and I had to go through some hyperlinked hoops to change it back to just plain old 404. I didn't look to see if they were earning from the pages.
Lifehacker recently had an article on a piece of software called the PC Decrapifier. I haven't tried it, but it seems relevant to this thread.
This claim may very well be FUD but there is a way for people to test. Just download a network packet capture program and look at the traffic being sent. I did this myself and didn't see anything untoward being sent nor did I see any gibberish traffic to indicate encryption. But, that isn't to say that I didn't miss anything when scanning the log of the output. Basically, anything offered by a for profit company for free, really is not. If the service were entirely gifted, the company would rapidly drift into the red. Also, read the EULA. I get scared by long convoluted statements which can be subjected to interpretation. I do like Dell hardware but the first thing I do when I get my dell is to delete the partitions, re-partition, and format the HDD. I recommend everyone doing the same.
If you don't want to reinstal: http://www.pcdecrapifier.com/ My mother in law bought one. Now I am used to your anti-virus no longer getting updated if you don't pay. But when her spamkiller expired, her email stopped working . And I can assure you there is NO WAY she would have been able to fix that herself without paying.
10 ?"Hello World" life was simple then
Using OpenDNS redirects mistyped URLs to their own site.
_ money
http://www.opendns.com/faq/#how_does_opendns_make
How does OpenDNS make money?
OpenDNS makes money by offering clearly labeled advertisements alongside organic search results when the domain entered is not valid and not a typo we can fix. OpenDNS will provide additional services on top of its enhanced DNS service, and some of them may cost money. Speedy, reliable DNS will always be free.
Now, to be fair I use OpenDNS at home, but I find it hard to take this kind of warning from a person who makes money the same way.
AFAICT Google is just used by Dell on the Dell search page, thats all.
This wouldn't have anything to do with opendns being powered by Yahoo, right?
they track everything you do on their "guide" from what links you click on, when you exit the page, uses hidden iframes, the list goes on all 50+kb of script to help you just like Verisigns sitefinder helped,
what they do deserve credit for is convincing people clever enough to change their DNS settings that somehow breaking DNS in exchange for seeing adverts is a worthwhile tradeoff, just like spyware/adware convinces a user that viewing adverts for getting weather is somehow a good thing.
perhaps they should team up with new.net as they do the same just using a binary to help change those pesky dns settings
here's how to stop their crap
add this to your hosts file
127.0.0.1 guide.opendns.com
anyone know if this breaks open dns's "shortcut" capability? if it does then it could be classed as malware.
I'm wondering who actually developed the software. Was it Google who developed it for Dell, or was it Dell who developed it internally and called it the "Google URL Assistant" because it redirects traffic to serve up Google ads which I presume it gets a cut off of. It's not clear if the name of the app means it was written by Google or if it just refers to what service Dell is redirecting to.
Idiot, n. A member of a large and powerful tribe whose influence in human affairs has always been dominant
This same thing happens at level of ISP - so bravo to Dell for taking advantage of it at computer level and using the leader in search relevance to give users something relevant. Anyone notice that the links offered on the Doogle page are EXACTLY what the user intended??
/microsoft/ example is even better the Doogle way - at least it shows MS as top links...
I recently moved and switched from VerizonDSL to Earthlink Cable (actually Road Runner with lower earthlink charges - which is actually Time Warner, etc.) and if I send a bum URL, I get an Earthlink-branded page that apparently is actually a 'myaccount' page. I have never installed anything from Earthlink on either of my computers and this happens automatically.
Talk about spyware, this redirector happens who knows where - Time Warner,RR,Earthlink, etc. - so clearly someone is spying on me:) although it only works on structural URL typos. if I put the examples used in articles (digg.xom and http://microsoft/ I get earthlink redirect and IE error page, respectively. This page source has to come from somewhere. Heck the
And OpenDNS seems more like a cyber-squatter of typo-domains, who's tryin' to make a dime off it. ANd boohoo - have you seen opendns homepage? it is identical to Doogle page, except it is OpenDNS brand at top insted of Dell. They even use Google!!!
And it really bothers me seeing Geeks misappropriate words for propaganda purposes because it debases the word itself. Think about the word "innovate" since Microsoft started describing everything they did as innovative.
There is nothing evil in this particular story. As far as I'm aware Google has never performed an evil act. You might not approve of, for example, the decision to launch their search engine in China and comply with the laws of the local government even when that meant censoring search results. You might feel that given China's less than stellar human rights record operating in China at all is a bad thing (though you might also like to wonder if Google should be operating in America given the international outrage that is gutananimo bay and the process of "extraordinary rendition"). But to describe this evil blinds you to proper examples of corporate evil like, say Microsoft's actions towards Netscape, or Microsoft's actions towards Go, or Worldcom).
Yesterday I got a lot of feedback from people who just assumed I was biased and an underdog out to complain about Google. This is not what it's about!
Here's what I mean:
Use the smell test. Does what Google is doing smell bad? Is it giving users a good experience?
Compare:
with
(and if you want to see ours)
If you just compare what google is doing to their own users you'll see that they are showing a terrible experience to the users who are Locked-In versus the users who have the choice to use any search service.
Thanks,
davidu
# Hack the planet, it's important.
Internet Explorer has always redirected you to Microsofts homepage in some way, why shouldn't Dell/Google be allowed to do the same?
We have a vested interest in this space, that's also how we figured out what Google was doing. And we have a vested interest in giving people a great experience. I don't think I'm being hypocritical in my post at all. Go to the dell page and search for microsoft.xom, then go to Google and search for microsoft.xom. When users are trapped and locked-in, they are taking advantage of them. When users have choice (like on google.com) they are given a great experience.
9 62/
I'm not being a hypocrite. Everyone who uses OpenDNS is doing it by choice which means we have to deliver a fantastic experience. And for the record, when you type microsoft.xom into your browser when using OpenDNS, we just correct those kinds of typos automatically. We don't make a cent on 'em, and that's fine. Most of those corrections are corrections to trademarked words and it gets scandalous to try and take advantage of 'em.
Compare things side by side: http://www.flickr.com/photos/dannysullivan/510738
-davidu
# Hack the planet, it's important.
when I consult with my customers on Dell purchases, I advise them to bring it to my shop to work on first thing. I boot it up, go through the setup for them, and remove Google desktop / toolbar (why IE7 has pop up blockers, anti phishing, and a search bar, and Firefox has all that and more) and then towards the bottom of a fresh Dells add remove programs list is "Search Assistant." Remove it, because an end user doesn't need the extra junk installed.
I'm like a superhero, but with no powers or motivation.
Setting aside the fact that using IE at all is the best way to get infected with spyware in general[1], the alternative to Dell's site is NOT Google's normal page.
The only way to get to Google's page from Internet Explorer in its default configuration is to explicitly go to google.com, and with the redirector in place you still get to the regular google home page if you do that.
If you open up Internet Explorer without the redirector and type a "keyword" into it, you normally end up on Microsoft's search engine.
Given the alternative of going to MSN.com or a Dell-branded google.com, I know which one I prefer.
[1] If you care you should be using Firefox which (for all its flaws) has a design that's many times more secure than IE...
Quite whining David. You have a good product. But, your comments sound like some kid whose toys were taken away.
Looks to me like you need to partner with someone to be bundled with their stuff. Can you get integrated into an application like Firefox that everyone needs? Or, can you partner with, say HP, to provide this functionality?
How 'bout some constructive suggestions?
To Copy from One is Plagiarism; To Copy from Many is Research.
I had to do some network setups of new Dell machines with the toolbar preinstalled. The redirector was actually a huge headache because it overrode the instructions issued when a machine was attached to the server. So instead of automatically redirecting users to the company's intranet, they found themselves getting sent to the Google/Dell custom page. Definitely did a number on my trust of Google.
It wasn't me, it was the one-armed
Are you seriously using the 'just because they make the cigarettes, doesn't mean that they're forcing people to smoke them' arguement???
Pay attention fanboys!
Just another argument...
for FireFox.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
It might not smell bad to you, but from the examples you've given, the OpenDNS page shows nothing if I have JavaScript disabled. Now, I've never had search results require JavaScript to show up so this looks very suspicious to me. I might be a little paranoid; that seems far more worse to me than a few text ads and a Dell or Sony logo.
Read your own privacy policy and then evaluate if calling your own service "spyware" is appropriate.
http://www.opendns.com/privacy/
It appears to me by using your dns service instead of the one provided by an isp, I forfeit the ability to have my dns lookups remain anonymous. That seems to fall closer to the definition of spyware in my book.
I certainly hope you have insurance against a disgruntled worker replacing www.mybanknamehere.com with www.myphishingsite.com
It appears to me by using your dns service instead of the one provided by an isp, I forfeit the ability to have my dns lookups remain anonymous. That seems to fall closer to the definition of spyware in my book.
Your DNS requests are not anonymous right now. Don't mislead yourself into believing they are. Even if you run your own resolver that talks to the roots. DNS is one of the most tapped, mined and inspected pieces of the infrastructure I can think of. People do it for profit (domainers) and for research (security folks).
We're clear on how we use it (which is to say, we don't use it for anything personally identifiable or to target ads to you).
-david
# Hack the planet, it's important.
>I've always flattened mine first...
I've tried various methods of flattening my computer as well, but they always end up non-functional. What's your secret?
More like profoundly naive.
You know how Dell makes money doing this? They get paid by Google and take a cut of the ad revenue--the result of an agreement with Google.
If you think Google just made a nifty tool and Dell decided unilaterally to use it, then I've got a fine, fine piece of real estate to sell you in Florida. Or maybe you'd like to buy into my Nigerian venture? It's cheap and easy and guaranteed to make you a bajillionaire in minutes flat!
"Everyone who uses OpenDNS is doing it by choice which means we have to deliver a fantastic experience."
You guys do make me laugh and I mean that in an endearing way. Sadly, the catchy buzz words and individualist mindset of the dot.bomb era are long gone. In case you guys are still handing out free mountain dew to your coders and allowing people to skateboard around the office, the cold steel bottom line of net profit now dominates all things Internet. It sounds to me like a small time niche VC startup (OpenDNS) is upset that the (inevitable) actions of the large players (Google/Dell) has eaten into the primary cash flow of the business and you're pissed about it.
Now the question begs, what other "fantastic" services are your users/customers willing to pay for? I have a feeling that Google/Dell doesn't give a sh** about putting you out of business in the wake of their toolbar deal.
Oh no, Google knows that I'm using Firefox! That narrows it down to me and 199,999 other people. Not exactly personally identifying information.
Support Right To Repair Legislation.
Hold on, let me take out my iPod earbuds and get off my scooter. :-)
Ok. Done.
Google isn't impacting our revenue, read the post. They are just being lame to their users. They are putting their partnership in front of user experience, for the first time. Hence the title of my blog, "Google has turned a page."
# Hack the planet, it's important.
You may correct the user's misspelling and send them merrily on their way - you still get the data.
You get a LOT of data on users DNS usage which would be worth a lot of money to a lot of people. You may or may not be using it - but it's there.
I'm not much of a Google fanboy but this criticism is hypocritical.
Way too many people are into typosquatting now. From OpenDNS to the "toolbar" guys to the guy who paid off the government of Cameroon (try anything in ".cm"), there can now be several layers of typosquatting between the user and the actual domain. At least we got Network Solutions to back off from their attempt.
Search may be coming apart. There are too many people trying to "game" the search systems now. "Search engine optimization" used to be viewed as evil and was done by low-rent operations. Now we have publicly held companies (Marchex, ticker symbol MCHX) formed just to create dummy domains. Collactive, the Digg spammer, just got venture capital from Sequoia Ventures. Computer vendors load up their preinstalled machines with unwanted "toolbars", which, as this article mentions, produce mostly user-hostile information. All the sources of information which drive search engines, from inbound links to user ratings, are now being spammed by sizable companies. It's a big change from the situation two years ago, when the troublemakers were all little guys with limited resources.
It's going to get worse before it gets better.
Dell adds these software packages because the software companies offer kickbacks to Dell, enabling them to lower the price of the hardware. It's factored into the price. That's also why their bundles are cheaper than buying parts individually. They assume that most people don't want to reimage their computer, or don't know how, or don't want to spend the time to do it, which is why the software companies push for the software to get preinstalled in the first place.
You can call me a hypocrite the day that I sell or share the data with a third party. Until then, I suppose you'll have to settle for calling me a "potential future hypocrite." I can live with that. We get phone calls all the time about buying our DNS data. For lots of money. We've never once even considered selling it. This is a core belief we have at the company.
# Hack the planet, it's important.
but not the people in management; they tend not to think unless it involves their stock options, and the status quo is fuck the world show me the money.
waspleg
Fair enough, and I applaud you if it's true - but I have no way to verify. So I always assume people will do what it takes to make money and lots of it while still attempting to do "the right thing". But in the end, money most always wins.
Oh, while I have your ear (eye?) - opendns is a great service, kudos to you and your company.
Go to this page: http://google.navigation.opendns.com/
I hope you can see that that isn't Google.
If you know how DNS works and look behind the curtain, you'll notice that the OpenDNS resolvers don't return A records for www.google.com, but a CNAME (alias) record "google.navigation.opendns.com", which makes the resolver lookup that name instead. That resolves to 208.69.34.231, which is in an OpenDNS network range of IP addresses. That's the server you connect to when you use OpenDNS and go to www.google.com. The URL bar won't change because according to the OpenDNS resolver, 208.69.34.231 is the IP address of www.google.com, which is just a non-canonical name of that IP address, and that is a BIG FAT LIE.
Show of hands: Who uses OpenDNS and is aware of that hijacking? Now who's the spy?
http://www.pcdecrapifier.com/
Hmmm, but if they are being lame to their users, and you guys are providing the same "fantastic" experience, then doesn't 1 + 1 = 2? You have to know how your position sounds to anyone who reads your FAQ on the OpenDNS site related to revenue and then your blog on the "lamers" over at Google/Dell. It reminds me of the episode of COPS where the crack addict calls the cops because the dope dealer stole her $20. ;-)
You can call me a hypocrite the day that I sell or share the data with a third party
Are you implying that you wouldn't sell any derivatives of that data?
When I was a kid, we only had one Darth.
Frankly, I don't give a damn whether or not you sell or share the data. What I do care about is that you hijack requests for valid domains and redirect them to your own servers. OpenDNS tells me that the IP addresses for "www.google.com" are 208.67.217.230 and 208.67.217.231, which is a flat-out lie. Those addresses are actually your own machines which are proxying traffic between me and the real Google servers. At the very least this gives you data on my search habits. Your servers could easily change the data that Google returns to insert your own ads in the results.
Google is merely redirecting typos to the clearly labeled pages of their affiliates. This is in no way deceitful. What you're doing, on the other hand, is. OpenDNS is silently intercepting all of their customers' traffic to Google with absolutely no indication that this is going on. That's not merely hypocritical, that borders on criminal.
I'd never heard of OpenDNS before this article. I'm glad that now I have. Now I can clearly recommend staying as far away as possible from your so-called "enhanced user experience".
Chelloveck
I give up on debugging. From now on, SIGSEGV is a feature.
Are you implying that you wouldn't sell any derivatives of that data?
.cm thing -- and publish the results though.
You mean like selling domainers a list of all unregistered domains?
Correct, we will never sell that kind of data. It's not the right thing to do. It also doesn't make any business sense. If the data has so much value to someone else that they're willing to pay a large price for it then it probably has value to keep to yourself. That's not our entire rationale, but it's a part of it. It's a bad PR move, it's a bad business move to do. Etc.
I can't think of every example, but I can say we've never sold our data, or any derivative of it to date. If we do, we'll probably do it in a public way. Like share some DNS data with researchers. If we do that, we'll make sure not to cause any AOL Search-style disaster. But even sharing with researchers has never happened.
I do want to do some personal research on the
# Hack the planet, it's important.
... not all users know how or what to uninstall - and some of it is virtually uninstallable.
By way of example; my Grandmother got a Dell. She's 80 odd, but can use a browser, email, etc. Her Dell was great - but she couldn't wo rk out why she wasn't able to receive emails. Time and again, she, or her friends would, with or without telephone support - would configure Outlook Express correctly - only to find that that it kept changing the POP3 server URL. I gave her remote assistance - and could swear it was working; but every time she told me it wasn't owrking, sure enough - the POP3 details had changed. Eventually, I tracked it down to McAfee which had a year's subscription to anti-virus; but 30 days' subscription to an entirely unnecessary spam blocker. A bug in their spam blocker meant that it correctly diverted all attempted POP3 connections to itself; but then screwed up the address of the actual POP3 box and couldn't actually connect. Of course, it only inserted itself at boot time - so every time I'd fixed it by remote desktop it looked great; till Gran rebooted...
I disabled this - but only after Gran had basically been emailless for 3 weeks. Lo and behold! On day 30 - it suddenly prevented here using email again - this time because its license had expired - so it refused to allow her to use her email app - even without it! Cue - Add/Remove Programs. Only it wouldn't allow itself to be removed because its AntiVirus companion was running... it took me hours to clear out this crap. And yet - without me doing it; Gran couldn't get her email, first because of their sloppy coding - and then because of their "license expiry" hijack.
That's why crapware preinstall should be banned. By all means - include a CD or a link to a website where I can choose to download trials - but preinstalling them is outrageous. Imagine if a car came with a pre-installed alarm system which wouldn't let you drive the car without getting out your credit card or a screwdriver?
Digging deeper, I found that the answer to why they're doing this is in fact in TFA linked to this same Slashdot story (emphasis mine): The solution to this problem was to route Google requests through a machine we run to check if the request is a typo or one of your shortcuts. If it is a typo or shortcut then we do what we always do, just fix the typo or launch your shortcut and send you off on your way. If it's not one of those two things, we pass it on to Google for them to give you search results. This solution provides the best of both worlds: OpenDNS users get back the features that they love and Google continues to operate without problems. Interestingly, OpenDNS does not capture the user's redirection to the Dell page, or else neither I nor any other OpenDNS user would be able to get to this example. The only reason they're doing this is to apparently keep their 'typo correction' and 'shortcuts' features, which immediately send you on your way without showing any ads or anything. So basically, OpenDNS is only attempting prevent the toolbar from breaking their free, non-advertisement services, which is a nice gesture considering they'd never get to show ads to these Dell users who use OpenDNS, and hence not make any money from them.
However, as seen in the forums, this little workaround seems to be breaking other things for other users, and is simply disconcerting to users such as myself who didn't know the reason for it.
Here's a temporary workaround for their workaround: go to 'google.com', no 'www'. On OpenDNS, this resolves normally: I wouldn't be surprised if OpenDNS is still working on it, though. They seem to be very conscious of their technically-minded userbase.
~ Aero
Driver Genius. It's not free (but cheap) and before you flatten it, it'll suck out all the drivers for you hardware and make an executable that you can just run and it'll install all the drivers you need. Thus, you've got yourself a clean system that's fully functioning :)
Half a page of sponsored links vs. silently fixing the typo and sending the user on their way is 'the same'?
Scoping my statement is a very cute way to respond. I like that. Upper managment has made scoping an artform. LOL. Let's have a closer look here... Now, you may argue that people proactively use your service while Dell/Google customers don't get to make that choice - ok. However, uninstalling the toolbar (or disabling the BHO) is very simple and the user can proactively stop using the Dell/Google toolbar the same way they can proactively modify DNS settings to use your service. So now we're down to one thing - the silent fix which Google/Dell does not do. That's pretty nice of you guys to do especially since it's done for free. But are you going to tell me that OpenDNS does not select which fixes to make? Of course not. You have to select which fixes to make so this means you know exactly when you're going to fire up the "fantastic service" for your users, which is the exact same framework as the Dell/Google "fantastic service". Your FAQ on your site says this is exactly what you do to make money. So, do you back what your FAQ states or what your blog says? Ya can't have it both ways and expect people to not call you on the carpet for sounding like a hypocrite.
Just format drive C:. No more of this 'spyware' business you Windows users speak of.
Google plans to take over the internet like Wal-Mart took over retail. You cant easily boycott it, its everywhere, everyone uses it, and it kills smaller competitors like human vs. ants. And its based on capitalism, which Bit-Torrent users everywhere grimace at.
I use OpenDNS at home, because I find it faster than my ISP DNS, and I don't really mind the siteminder-like tricks they play with mis-typed URLs for two reasons - first, I find their search results to be accurate (I think they mus be powered by Yahoo or Google). Second, I installed them *myself*, and I cna uninstall them myself.
But seriously - this Dell/Google thing is the EXACT same idea. It is easy to uninstall and I can see no one hiding it's existance. If OpenDNS has any complaints about it it is just because they were not chosen for the factory install!