Dirty Web Promotion Tricks #1 - Legitimate and Malicious
Javascripts
One of the best way to get visitors to further explore your
site is to convince them to set your home page as their Internet
start page, or for them to add you their "Favorites". In this
article, we'll examine some ethical and unethical ways this is
done.
Many sites include legitimate javascripts that allow visitors to
easily add a page to their "Favourites" by clicking on a link. A
script to achieve this would look like something along the lines
of:
=================================================================
====== SAMPLE Legitimate "BOOKMARKING" SCRIPT:
=================================================================
=======
This script should work well in most 4+ browsers. It is as
simple as I could make it, and was put together using a number
of free scripts available as a reference. There are many other
scripts available that allow for the use of images and status
bar text.
In this script:
- When Netscape is detected, it only displays a message
suggesting that the visitor uses the Ctrl+D command to bookmark
the page and the scripting will not appear in the source code of
the page.
- In Internet Explorer, it will add your homepage to this
visitor's "Favorites" from any page in the site - along with a
custom description you specify in the script.
- Other types of javascript enabled browsers will only display
the suggestion to bookmark (no keyboard commands as this can
vary browser to browser), and the script will not be displayed
in the source code.
Unfortunately, some companies do not use ethical methods to gain
a valued place in a visitors Favorites or bookmarks.
On visiting a web design resource site the other day via a
search engine link, my anti-virus program jumped up and alerted
me with the following:
"real-time protection has found that C:WINDOWSTEMPORARY INTERNET
FILESCONTENT.IE5S3QFQF0XADVERTS[1].HTM is JS.IEStart trojan."
I hadn't clicked on anything! This script had been activated
simply through me visiting the page. There were no warnings on
the page that this was going to occur. What the javascript had
done was to reset my "home" page and added entries to "My
Favourites"! I examined the script that had caused it occur and
while I won't publish it here for obvious reasons, I can assure
you that it would qualify as a "scumvertising" tactic.
When restarting IE I found that via an ezine site and another
marketing company (from where the script was called), I was
being redirected to a very well known software companies' home
page. In total, there were 4 companies involved in this
particular incident - I look forward to the responses to the
emails I will send them.
If you have had this happen to you, I'd like to know about
it.......
The JS.IEStart trojan is also known as VBS.Passon (CA),
VBS.PassOn (NAV) VBS/IEstart.gen.
While it is not destructive, I object strongly to other
companies adding sites to My Favourites and altering the default
home page without my permission or knowledge. If I hadn't had my
AV program running in the background, I probably never would
have figured out where this script came from. I have since then
copied the scripts, along with appropriate screenshots pending
further action.
It is an invasive, disgusting marketing tactic that only serves
to irritate visitors; and it helps give the web marketing
industry a bad name. I am sure the company I was redirected to
will be interested in knowing that their advertising cash is
being spent on a marketing firm who uses, in my opinion,
illegitimate means to send visitors to them. It is a waste of
their money as they are recieving traffic that is not targeted -
what is known as "garbage traffic".
To the companies that incorporate this type of ploy as part of
their "bleeding edge" marketing technology - "may you live in
interesting times"! You will be caught out!
It's bad enough that we have to travel the 'net with our AV
programs and firewalls on "paranoid" mode - do we now have to
have "pop up killers" running all the time as well?
Michael Bloch michael@tamingthebeast.net
http://www.tamingthebeast.net Tutorials, web content and tools,
software and community. Web Marketing, eCommerce & Development
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