Real Evil: ISP Inserted Advertising

Just install an anti NebuAD plugin for firefox, it will be available soon enough I am sure.

I agree. Get firefox and get a noads plugin. It shouldn’t bother you beyond that. Avantbrowser also comes with an ads blocker.

I think it is good that blogs such as techcrunch are raising awareness of software like this. Until now, it has been unheard of for ISPs to directly edit the content that travels through their network. Advertising is found on enough sites that users would never realize they were being cheated by their own ISP. This is definitely a major red-flag. How will ISPs edit pages next? Fail to render parts of competitor’s sites? Allow partners to portray their competitors in a negative way?

Sounds pretty bad, actually.

“Real Evil” compared to what though? *smiles*

Just kidding Duncan. This isn’t a particularly kosher method of increasing exposure rates on ads. What if competitive advertising starts appearing on publisher’s pages?

ISPs should really think twice about subscribing to things like this.

The solution already exists as addons for for Firefox:
Adblock Plus: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1865
Filterset.G: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1136

Steve
I’m not going down that path, but lol none the less

This is an interesting concept. What is the legality of this? If an end user is paying an ISP for internet access what kind of contractual agreement do they enter into relative to the content being offered?

This is just a waste of time. Soon someone is gonna be hit hard and do something…like takem to court where they will have no chance against the class action.

the firefox plugin fix that will no doubt be built if this becomes reality will only be useful for tech savvy people with the understanding of how to install plugins.

For the many millions of ordinary people that browse the web, they won’t know to install this plugin.

I take great care in delivering a good user experience, now ISP’s are gonna take that away from me!

If this happens, and i highly doubt it, then ill be going down the legal courts avenue!

Where exactly do the ads show up? I would be interested in seeing a screenshot of where they are inserting them.

It seems like this would also screw up the formatting for a lot of sites.

I’m waiting for microsoft to install ad blocking on explorer by default. “Why should explorer be the billboard for advertisers without getting compensated for that”.

Yes, 20-25% can just use a different browser, but most of those (e.g., firefox users) are blocking ads anyway.

Most important question: Where do I surf to to see this in action?

The web is all atwitter about this, but I have yet to be affected, I think.

I want to see this in action. I want to see what it does to the sites I create for my clients.

I actually met these guys, as we looked at implementing a mesh network in a city I worked for a year ago.

They are SOOOO full of shit and complete idiots. I felt like someone had picked my pickets after every meeting with them.

Needless to say we didn’t use them..

There needs to be in place protection for content providers, others placing ads on content that has taken effort and cost to create just feels wrong. I think this issue needs to and will be clarified. I’m surprised the companies involved in this do not feel any moral injustice.

As someone who is working to monetize new marketing channels, I think businesses like this give all of us in the advertising industry a bad name. It’s really appalling.

How could this be related or effected by net neutrality?

This can’t be legal

IANAL, but I believe that everything is automatically copyrighted, without having to register with the Copyright Office. I’d argue that the ISP is creating an illegal derivative work for profit of every page they serve. Check your access logs… if you get a visit from this ISP, you could sue. Unregistered copyrights are eligible for actual damages, but if you register with the Copyright Office, you become eligible for statutory damages as well (regardless of actual loss of profit).

According to the article, the ISP can’t disable the ads on certain URLs. I can’t wait for them to show up in my access logs. I love sending cease & desist letters, and they can’t desist without turning it off completely.

Having used AdBlock and FF consistently for ages now I am really offended and insulted whenever I see ads online these days, they’re much more impactful in terms of annoyance. If I was getting ads like these inserted that way, I would flip out.

I don’t like this ISP, but I think that I, as a web user, can choose to load my browser up with whatever HTML I choose. If that HTML is TechCrunch with all the ads blocked, that is my right (and I’m enjoying it right now, haha). If that HTML is TechCrunch with the ads replaced by other ads, or pictures, or text, or whatever I feel like, that’s OK, too.

By default, web content creators are publishers who can push me whichever ads they want. That is only because most people don’t change the HTML before they look at it. But if I feel like only reading part of the HTML (either by physically avoiding it with my eyes, or by using AdBlock to rip chunks of it out), that is fine. It is no different from purchasing a book and only reading Chapter 3. Unquestionably a fair use.

For me, the real issue with this ISP’s behavior is that it is duping its customers (presumably, anyway, although I haven’t seen their service agreements). Of course, probably only about 25% of people would care, anyway, and those people will be using Firefox and AdBlock, haha.

What I’m really looking forward to is when the patent on this scheme issues…

I believe Adzilla (http://www.adzilla.com/services_serviceprovider.html) has been providing this service to ISPs for several years now, so I believe the Texan ISP is not the first one out there.

lol, it is like the USPS opening your daily newspaper before delivering and inserting their ads. doesnt sound viable to me. texas cowboys ISPs have to understand that they are nothing more than the digital mail man.

I liken this to a video rental company removing previews and replacing them with their own advertisements.

What if I put a disclaimer on my site stating that any redistribution or modification of the content requires written permission? NubeAd then replaces my content with advertisements, in an attempt to defraud customers into thinking the ads have originated from my website.

Doesn’t that violate my terms (hypothetically, of course). What does Mr. Arrington have to say about this?

Duncan,

I think you need to get a screenshot from a subscriber… My understanding of NebuAD is that it’s more like Adzilla and only modifies the ads on pages where they have an existing relationship with the ISP _AND_ the publisher. Not just any random page.

I could be wrong but….

David
the shot above is said to be from a subscriber, haven’t been able to find a full screenshot to date.

Look… they’re running a business here, and have payroll to make. They run ads to make that payroll.

Robert Dewey,

Those terms you describe are called “copyright.”

… and drug dealers sell drugs to make their payroll too…

??

Marshall;

But of course

But still, it takes “modification” to a new level. Generally, when thinking about copyright, it’s usually in the form of someone stealing your work - not altering the way it looks or feels while at the site itself.

David, sounds like blocking their domain would be another great feature for OpenDNS. - Owen

@Noah.

I’d have to disagree with your view on ads. My salary is paid purely out of ad-generated revenue. The site I works for provides a free service that wouldn’t survive without ads.

Almost every website out there would fail if the majority of users started blocking ads. There would be no motivation for anyone to develop new sites and services.

Some ad providers pay per view rather that per click, so the argument that you don’t click on ads doesn’t hold water. By clocking ads you’re sending a big F***-You to people who spend their time creating content.

Wow - that’s equivalent to a local bookstore or newstand taking magazines from the publisher, and gluing their own ads in. Or actually, it would be equivalent to the trucking firm that ships magazines from publisher to newstand getting into the advertising business by slicing & pasting in magazines that they ship.

Crazy.

Last month while attending Railsconf, I was amazed to find Portland’s Metrofi free wifi did something like this. While somewhat more distinguishable from these ads, it did insert ads directly into the top of pages. Additionally, every few requests would bring up a full page ad with a link to continue to the actual page.

Granted, the service was free. But, it still has the same issues of altering content during transmission without the consent or knowledge of the content creator.

Screw getting a screen-shot, I want source so that I can build in my delayed javascript call to seek and destroy that ad once it shows up.

Or, maybe replace it with a free ad for a competitive service.

This is similar to Gator’s adware serving competitors pop ads based on what website you were viewing. Visiting 123Widgets.com? See pop-ups for WidgetDepot.com and so on..

That was a good racket for Gator for a while but their were eventually stopped by the courts (If I recall).

On the scumbag scale I’d say it ranks below Gator and just above Nigerian 419 scams. What a bunch of buffoons.

This is not a copyright issue. It’s a terms of use issue. Contract law, not copyright law. There’s a difference. (Michael, where the hell are you? Can you babysit Duncan.)

The problem is that with contract issues, you have to spend the money to sue them. With copyright, you have the DMCA. And with Web site terms of use contract issues, you need to get the court to enforce a browsewrap, which is a bit touch and go.

@Josh

I have to respectfully disagree.

Your usage is subject to the Texas law known as “tough titty”. As in, any business, however established, which is basically a bunch of hot air (albeat well-established) floating on parasitic behavior, needs to be ready for constant seismic shifts in its business.

Claiming unfair on the *consumer* is a crock. Imagine a full-page ad in the New Yorker which reads “throwing away those advertising insert cards without reading them? Shame on you!” Yeah, I didn’t think you would imagine that, because you, like, me, my mom, and everybody else is already throwing them away without care.

Adblock is that same agent, for web sites. (If only there was an adblock for my paper subscriptions.)

Don’t blame crappy economics on the person you claim to be giving free stuff to. Stop giving them free stuff, and give them a reason to pay for better quality not-free stuff. Or just figure out how not to include them in the financial equation at all (like we’ve been doing all along without admitting it) and let them have a free ride because the VCs like it.

But blaming the ad-blockers for re-establishing control over what they have rightfully paid/not-paid for is ludicrous.

(If you don’t agree, I’ll happily send you some of my homemade biscotti under no obligation. And then I’ll bitch and moan to no end when you refuse to pay for the biscotti you have eaten. Just send me your address and we’ll get this real-world analogy rolling.)

“This is not a copyright issue. It’s a terms of use issue. Contract law, not copyright law. There’s a difference.”

Are you sure that a company modifying _my_ source code and redistributing the modified version to third parties for it’s own profit isn’t copyright violation?

It certainly wouldn’t be considered fair-use (whereas user installed ad-blockers may well be).

How is it not copyright violation? Please explain it, Mr Condescending Smarty Pants….. (Looking at you Stephen)

majornetworknews and derrick,

Sure, savvy web users will find a solution to block those ads with plug ins or such, but the real victims here are the users who don’t even recognize that the ads are not part the the website they’re viewing. And the content providers who are getting robbed out their ad revenues or reputation if they’re not running ads (e.g. Wikipedia)

I’m sure this will die soon, it has to, because it just ain’t right!

As an affiliate marketer myself, I’m very familiar with parasitic software out there who robs legit affiliates out of their commission (eBates, Upromise, Mypoints etc.)

This has already been widely used in China’s ISPs, including China Telecom. China Internet users almost get used to dealing with those evil things include (but not limited to) :

* DNS hijack: hijack your DNS, in most case it will redirect when the domain name have difficulty to be resolved. It’s useless to set your own DNS since they hijack from the packet level and will send you faked DNS reply packet.

* Packet hijack: hijack from packet level, the HTTP packet, DNS packet can be hijacked. They inject code in HTPP replies so you could get popups from any website!

* Great Firewall: don’t need to say more…

I would say if they would ask the customer: “should we replace the ads for you” and he aggress, it is ok (judical). For example nobody would sue Firms who offer tuning services for cars, only beacause they change the appearance.

But if a Firm modifies a car and then sell it as a “original product”, i would say that isn’t allowed.

The only weapon for the content provider could be exclude Customers who don’t view their ads.

This being an ISP, I wonder if the customer agreement explicitly calls this out. If so, then it may be totally legit. The real question is whether this sort of action is legitimate, whether in a customer agreement or not. But if its in a customer agreement and the customer has agreed to it (I’d think that most people just dont read the customer agreement), I guess there’s nothing illegal about it.

I wouldn’t wanna use this ISP myself, but then again, may be the rates are better/cheaper due to these ads.

Am I the only one who finds the “look, over there, there is a 3-day old Jaiku post about people do much evil advertising stuff then we are” whilst keeping the payola controversy Techcrunch is involved in restricted to shooting-the-messenger posts on Crunchnotes inappropriate?

Is Techcrunch now competing with Valleywag by stooping to the same level?

The license on my blog includes “The contents of this blog is licensed under a non-commercial share-alike license. This means (among other things) that you may not put my content on a web page that contains Google AdWords or any other similar advertising.”

I issue DMCA take-down notices when my license is violated. I have had one web site removed from the net because of this (their ISP cancelled their account and so far they have not got a new account) and had another company stop mirroring my blog.

If someone finds adverts being illegally inserted into a modified copy of my blog then please send me some screen-shots and I’ll send DMCA take-down notices to the relevant people.

This is ludicrous. I get annoyed enough because I see an ad page for Orange services every time I mistype a URL (hijack advertising by ex-Wanadoo boss).

To think that an ISP could potentially be placing ads inline with the sites I’m looking at is scary, to say the least!

I really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really hope that this isn’t the start of a trend.

Back in the early 00’s I used an ISP which forced ads on you, so this isn’t new. The difference was that the ISP at the time was free, unheard of at the time. They also placed the ads in a toolbar across the top of the screen, and not on the sites themselves, so they were far less intrusive.

I’m just waiting for the javascript which blocks users of this ISP and pops up an explanation as to why. Let’s face it, no one but the ISP benefits from this, and the ISP is the one who is getting paid anyway!

I have a friend paying $300/mo for a T1 from these guys and they still cram ads down the pipe.

while i don’t like ads myself (search is good enough to find what i want, when i want it), i can’t help noticing all the google ads plastered on the page you write this on…i suppose you have “approved” each of these ads as well?

to me, ads = evil - they are an interruption and messy alternative to an otherwise clean design, and contrary to previous posts, i DO hope everyone in the world uses ad blocking software to force the genre into more intelligent and less obnoxious formats. the world would be a better place if we weren’t so bombarded and distracted by information we have no intention of pursuing.

Why dont ISPs partner with OPENDNS and get some search ad $$$ ?
Better than injecting display advertising…

How long until I start seeing BestBuy ads in my browser as they bought the ISP Speakeasy? Maybethey won’t do something that idiotic, but I’m sure to get some junk real mail from them.

The more I think about this, people who read this blog are more likely to stop using this ISP if they continued this approach…

what about the rest?

Is there a way to distinguish between the ads that this ISP inserts in comparison to what the content provider inserts? If the ISP’s ads aren’t more intrusive, the avg internet user probably wouldn’t go through the hassle of making the switch…

Would content owners be able block the IP addresses of these ISPs?

Instead could content owners show a page saying why they are blocking this ISP, perhaps suggesting the user switches ISP and even show (paid for) links to competing ISPs?

Surely we can just make a function that tweaks the DOM to remove this crap… and then keep a tally for every advert removed. — Turn this into a bill for the ISP company.

I heard it is quite common among China’s ISP

Charter has replaced my 404 web page not found with their own advertizing page and paid ads.

G

This software must be prohibited and punished for it´s use. An ads blocker can´t avoid this soft…I think there is a plug in for this stuff. This article should be on every single web to aware users.

It’d be interesting to see what the ISPs TOS said before they started to grab up real estate on their customer’s websites.

It also seems like kind of a dishonest way to use someone else’s website to serve up ads…possibly even competing ads. If my ISP started using my hard-earned traffic for those purposes they could definitely expect a call from me and my attorney.

@Owen,

We already offer that functionality for users. You can block any domain you’d like (actually you can’t block .com, opendns.com or overture.com, but that’s it).

-David

@Jonas,

They are more than welcome to contact us. That goes for hardware manufacturers too.

-David

Sounds like a perfect motivator for solo to medium sized business to operate their own web server (box) where they “control” the pages being delivered. Or specifically look for honorable hosts that are VERY explicit that they will never do this sort of income hijacking.

A “service” such as this one is problematic, especially for people who are not particularly tech savvy. While most of us will be able to figure out a way around this problem, the Average Joe will not. I can’t imagine that this will be something tolerated for long.

First as far as the customers. They have to be pretty dumb to be paying for a broadband ISP that does that.

Second, this is pretty much asking for a lawsuit. Inserting ads on (on top of) other people’s web properties, not a good idea. Sounds like old school Gator and other adware type stuff.

So this won’t last long.

They should only do this to customers who agree to it and those customers should pay less or nothing.

This is no different from cable TV companies inserting ads in the pay TV channels, which they do regularly where I live.

“They should only do this to customers who agree to it and those customers should pay less or nothing.”

Actually it doesn’t matter how the customers feel about it. It’s the old argument of who owns the desktop. If someone comes to my site or anybody’s site here, an ISPs ads shouldn’t show up. If you want to use behavioral targetting on your own site, that’s one thing. Over or on other web properties, problem.

what a bunch of jerks!

I don’t think it’s a technical argument at all. It’s legal and if you enter into a contract with an ISP that will provide their own adds and you get Internet access for cheap then I think that would be a big business driver of the service.

So… is it legal? Seems like it is.

I am surprised at everybody’s reaction. Don’t you understand that ads fuel the web? Up a level - how do you think media (TV-cable-newspapers-radio) can to sustain itself? And why everybody assumes that nebuad is evel, and google is not? Because they will insert the ads without website permission? Are you sure? Do you know their business model?

I’m surprised nobody’s brought up the DCMA.

One of the major requirements for the safe harbor provision for service providers is that they do not alter or filter the data they transmit. This is clearly such an alteration.

Hence, they are now legally responsible for any pirating, illegal pornography (kiddie stuff, etc), and other shit that transmits over their network.

Check it out: Google the DCMA for yourself.

“This is similar to Gator’s adware serving competitors pop ads based on what website you were viewing”

Markus, funny you mention that, they’ve hired (or tried to hire) a lot of former Gator/Claria employees from what I’ve heard.

This is really horrible stuff. Things cudn’t possibly get any worse if such menace spreads over the internet. ISPs like these sld be banned and customers should know better than to use their services. Why pay for an ISP that hijacks their pages?

What I fear is that if this form of advertising works out, there might be ISPs in the future who will offer free internet connectivity in exchange for Ad display. If that happens it’s going to be a very bad mess for content based websites.

In any case serving ads right on the webpage is illegal and the company must be sued.

I would provide a full screen shoot, but we stored blocking the URL for Fair Eagle, and it now appears that they’ve removed or turned off the injection of the JavaScript.

The ads are in floating Divs and can be moved around in FF, but not IE. All browsers can close the ads by manually clicking the ‘x’ in the corner, but because it is injected inbound all browsers are affected. Most of the time it doesn’t appear to work in Opera, and it only appears to work on .com domains. It never shows up in the HTML for other sites. The ads only appear when the content is centered with margins on the side. If the computer uses a low resolution or the browser is sized smaller that the website requires to display its content then the ads don’t appear.

Luckily it didn’t affect outbound HTML, so the ads weren’t appended to our pages we served, but it annoyed the heck out of us.

When I tried the opt-out cookie it didn’t stop the injection or the ads. The Opt-out is only for the privacy agreement.

It doesn’t appear to replace any existing ads, just adds more in annoying floating windows.

“they’ve hired (or tried to hire) a lot of former Gator/Claria employees from what I’ve heard.”

“It doesn’t appear to replace any existing ads, just adds more in annoying floating windows.”

Yep. This is Gator 2.0!

Now for someone to write some server side code that redirects requests from the ISP’s customers to an information page about what they’re doing, with links to alternative providers in their area.

I’d certainly use this tactic on my site.

I have to say this is outragous, the only way this can be legal would be if it’s in the ISP’s terms and conditions, even so to think that any of my sites could be shown with advertising and potentially advertising that is unsuitable for my site’s content, like churches etc then I feel this is out of hand.

I certainly hope this does not become the norm, and more importantly i hope they don’t enforce a premium connection that doesn’t have these advertisements as that would be beyond belief!

Does anybody have a copy of Redmoon’s Privacy Policy/Terms of Service? Nothing is available on their website.

Something tells me that this practice is so much affront and scam, that by next year all providers would do this - one way or another. Mostly depends on how much money can be made with this model and if profit would offset the cost of lawsuits.

Seems like several of you would like to go back to the 80’s.

Do you understand the Google is nothing but an advertising machine? Their search is only a means to get advertising. Hold onto your hats because the analysts say that ALL of the major carriers will be using this technology because it brings relevant ads to subscribers via “behavioral targeting”.

Evil… yes… but I see this feature as a future source of “blackmail” in that “pay the isp an extra x$ a month to NOT have this technology implemented across your sites” kinda thing.

Jon

Aol use to have a fake internet / with a large black list of sites you couldn’t visit / including most Anti AOL sites

- Its a simple legal matter / You stuff a clause in teh middle of your TOS / that states - you provide … blah blah blah … for whatever.

- now this technology could help NetZero be a better - ADvertiser

The EFF should get involved–or some other group that represents the techs. Take those bastards to court for copyright violation and IP infringement.

Shut ‘em down, and donate the $ from the liquidation of their assets to charity!!

For sites that don’t sell stuff, ad revenue is the only way some folks make a living…

On second thought, there’s definite legal precedent regarding this sort of thing…and definitely a way for all those sites affected to sue for lost revenue, etc.

Theft of site real estate is still theft. Might as well reach into a billion website’s cash registers and help yourself. (let alone the possibility of inappropriate ads being served up—porn, anyone?)

Someone, end them.

End them, please.

Hmmm… I seem to recall a lot of ISPs defending themselves from libel charges, music industry piracy charges, etc. by way of arguing that they were not involved in the content. I wonder if the situation changes in this case. If one of these guys’ customers goes to a gambling site, child porn site, music piracy site, or whatever and these guys insert an ad, would they lose that shield and then could the Attorney General go after them?

#82 BloggerBoy may be on to something. If they lose common carrier status, they’re in the way of all content lawsuits.

liquidboy - ” I take great care in delivering a good user experience, now ISP’s are gonna take that away from me!
If this happens, and i highly doubt it, then ill be going down the legal courts avenue!”

Yeah, I do not think Google, or Microsoft, etc, will take kindly to this sort of thing

Why do websites that are full of ads speak of articles as if having ads is a bad thing? This site is riddled with advertisements. Anyhow, it would have to be copyright infringement upon every www creator to be placing these ads on their pages without their consent. If any of the pages we design are reported to us with having these ads put on them, compensation will be demanded in court. And for the record,
google = censorship, regardless of what they are tring to do, look no further then the owners shielding their personal information off the search giant. they don’t want you to find them, but they want everyone else to be able to find you, that’s censorship, that’s communism, that’s google:)
have a nice day!

I have no problem with adverts - or even models that add advertising in - free services that have a frameset with a banner in.

What I do object to is people inserting crap into my carefully constructed user experience. This is not like the cable company putting adverts between segments - this is like the cable company using CGI to insert things into the show or just placing big banners over the top of the show while it is running.

If it does become commonplace there will be a massive shift of power in the internet from the content providers to the ISP’s - for example if I am free to modify pages why not write a simple script that identifies google adwords and replaces them with my own chunk of identical HTML but with adverts I have sold instead. If enough ISP’s are doing this who in their right mind would pay google for ads that never got seen because ISP’s where not delivering them.

There are 3 issues here, there is no copyright issue. No one is stealing your content and using it as their own. It is deceitful, immoral, and potentually illegal.

1. The customer of the ISP. If the customer does not read the agreement that states by using this ISP he/she will allow these ads to be displayed, and without blocking them, could end up in legal trouble with the ISP if you block the ads. Even if you claim ignorance because you didn’t read the agreement you will still be liable for the ISP’s lost ad revenue. An agreement is a binding legal contract even if you don’t read it. Read the fine print BEFORE you agree to do anything!

2. The web site owner. If I have a web site that I choose to be ad free for whatever reason and some ISP overlays an ad on my site without my permission, this is hijacking my site for the purpose of making money. If I have a very successful site the ISP would have access to thousands of potential customers and added revenue with compensating me.

3. The legitiment advertiser. If I’m an advertiser on a website that pays for impressions instead of click throughs my ad could be covered by the overlayed ad causing me to potentially lose revenue. This would be the same as me advertising on a billboard and another company comes along and erects a billboard directly in front of mine. My ad is still there but, because no one can see it, I have lost potential revenue.

Does anyone know the class names, ids or any other relevant information that would allow web site providers to block this without modifying their layout?