Comments on: Unraveling a baroque, snarled, multimillion-dollar porn-ad clickfraud scam

By: s2redux

s2redux — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 20:41:00 +0000

Want to see just how interesting it is? Read Metaphors We Live By by Lakoff and Johnson.

By: digi_owl

digi_owl — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 19:58:00 +0000

I think it has been known for as long as there has been ad banners online…

What i find really funny is a supposed Swedish kid that raked in around a million SEK a year by basically running a page that linked to free porn sample galleries (this was back before *tube).

By: Steve

Steve — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 19:28:00 +0000

Yes, here you go:

pixel.adsafeprotected.com/jspix

The relevant function is called P, and tries various tricks to figure out the top frame URL, although it doesn’t seem to work in the versions of Chrome and Firefox that I have.

By: Panos Ipeirotis

Panos Ipeirotis — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 19:28:00 +0000

Steve, no need for hacks anymore. (Notice that the article is a year old.) There is a better solution: just check if the ad is visible in the browser. Check the new post at
http://www.behind-the-enemy-lines.com/2012/03/50-of-ads-are-never-seen.html

By: Jeremy

Jeremy — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 18:43:00 +0000

For those of us interested in helping with just that, have you already found some ads that use AdSafeMedia code?

By: tw1515tw

tw1515tw — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 18:33:00 +0000

Now we know what step 2 is in

Step 1. Create website.
Step 2. ?
Step 3. PROFIT!!!

By: Steve

Steve — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 18:11:00 +0000

“For the technically curious: reading the address of the top frame is a challenging problem. For security reasons, browsers do not allow cross-domain scripting. So, it is not possible to just call the “top” object and read its properties. We have a proprietary solution for this.”

In other words, AdSafe is using exploits to violate cross-domain javascript security policies and snoop on the sites you visit. I’m in the process of de-obfuscating their javascript so I can report this to the browser vendors, I’d encourage others (who are less easily distracted than me) to do the same.

By: BillGlover

BillGlover — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 18:11:00 +0000

Both economic systems and Soylent Green(tm) are comprised of people.

wait.. also disco flash mobs.

Economic systems, Soylent Green and disco flash mobs are comprised of people.

..and possibly robots.

Careful chewing the tasty Soylent Green Metallic(tm)

This message has secretly subscribed you to six different, quasi-religious self-help mailing lists while you were reading.

..seven.

By: SomeGuyNamedMark

SomeGuyNamedMark — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 17:35:00 +0000

No, soylent green is

By: EH

EH — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 17:24:00 +0000

Economic systems are comprised of people.

By: Jer_00

Jer_00 — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 17:20:00 +0000

Economic systems are biological systems for the most part – like an ant colony or a beehive but on a larger scale. Emergent behavior from a biological system.

By: nixiebunny

nixiebunny — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 16:50:00 +0000

The term “parasite” is used in the description of the scammer. It’s interesting to see how economic systems eventually take on the characteristics of biological systems.

By: tw1515tw

tw1515tw — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 16:16:00 +0000

Think you’re wrong about the monetary losers. To quote from the blog:

Effectively, the only one hurt in this chain are the big brand advertisers, who feed the rest of the advertising chain.