how-to block ads
|
Doctor Olds
I Need A Remedy For What's Ailing Me.
Premium,VIP
join:2001-04-19
1970 442 W30
clubs:
|  Bad Move.
Yeah, that's it. Make it up/cover it over to be about the Children.
Path: newsspool2.news.pas.earthlink.net!stamper.news.pas.earthlink.net!elnk-pas-nf1!newsfeed.earth link.net!news.maxwell.syr.edu!postnews1.google.com!not-for-mail
From: ericd@belkin.com (Eric Deming)
Newsgroups: news.admin.net-abuse.email
Subject: Re: [OT-evil marketing] Belkin does Verislime one better - router spam!
Date: 5 Nov 2003 15:25:28 -0800
Organization: »groups.google.com
Lines: 70
Message-ID: [c91e821d.0311051525.70aa9920@posting.google.com]
References: [3FA87D03.E1C44EDE@DutchElmSt.invalid] [wh-dnR5oc5YJnDSiU-KYhA@giganews.com]
NNTP-Posting-Host: 67.98.73.254
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
X-Trace: posting.google.com 1068074728 22743 127.0.0.1 (5 Nov 2003 23:25:28 GMT)
X-Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com
NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 5 Nov 2003 23:25:28 +0000 (UTC)
Xref: news.earthlink.net news.admin.net-abuse.email:2054409
X-Received-Date: Wed, 05 Nov 2003 15:25:29 PST (newsspool2.news.pas.earthlink.net)
"JerryMouse" [nospam@bisusa.com] wrote in message news: [wh-dnR5oc5YJnDSiU-KYhA@giganews.com]...
> Mr. Uh Clem wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> What does Belkin say when you complain?
>
> I'd make their life miserable until they removed the offending software from
> my machine.
>
> You did not conset to this aspect of your machine's modification - this is
> nothing less than malicious.
>
> Raise hell.
I was made aware of this posting by an e-mail that was sent to
Belkin's tech support e-mail box. Since I am a product manager for
Belkin's LAN products and was very involved with the development of
the Parental Control feature, I feel that I can shed some light on
this subject. Firstly, without trying to sound too stand-offish, we
are not talking about SPAM here. For me to clarify, an understanding
of the Parental Control service will really be needed.
Since Parental Control is a subscription service, Belkin wanted to
make registering for the service very easy. Since the router actually
will work in tandem with an outside server (Cerberian,
www.cerberian.com) registration information needs to be collected and
sent to Belkin and Cerberian to activate an account. Traditional
methods of registration, such as asking the user to go to a website or
navigate to the Router's internal Web page to enter information didn't
meet the ease-of-use goal. We elected to re-direct one http request to
the "Register Now" reminder page. (There is a link in a previous
posting if you want to see it) This page asks the user to register for
the service for a free 6 month trial. Now, granted this looks like an
ad. It should, it is intended to be informative and easy enough to
understand. At this point, the user can register or click "No Thanks".
Clicking "No Thanks" sets a flag in the Router to stop the Router from
re-directing every 8 hours to the reminder page. (Again remember, only
one http request every 8 hours). Admittedly, there is no controlling
which computer on the LAN this message will pop up on. If the user
just closes the window without clicking "No Thanks", then the flag is
never set, and the reminders will continue. Now, if you are the type
that doesn't want to click the "No Thanks" button, then no problem.
Navigate to the Router's internal web interface (default IP =
192.168.2.1), click on the Parental Control menu. In the Menu, select
"Don't Remind every 8 hours" (This phrase actually varies a bit, but
you get the idea) then click "Apply Changes". DONE. Nothing to it. By
the way, this procedure might have to be done if your router is behind
a firewall. Reason: filter.belkin.com sends a response to the Router
to set the flag. Firewalls will block the response. This might explain
the problem in a school for instance.
We did this not to be evil, we did this to make sure that any
non-techy person (part of our target audience) would have ample
opportunity to opt in or out of the free 6 month trial of the Parental
Control feature. The Router doesn't collect information on you and
send it to Belkin. We don't have the ability to SPAM you at a later
time if you select "No Thanks" or turn off the Reminder manually. I
know this feature might be misunderstood and might PO some people. I
know the manual could do a better job explaining it. These are all
things that we at Belkin are working to remedy.
Oh, one last bit, when upgrading firmware for the Routers that
originally shipped without the Parental Control feature, the new
firmware has this feature added. This was by popular demand. Our
customer install base began to notice the Parental Control feature on
new models that we are shipping, and wanted a solution for themselves
without having to buy a new product. So, we accommodated them.
I'm happy to answer any questions if you have any. Thanks!
The lost message saved by Agent newsreader.  | |
Ewalking
join:2002-11-14
not saying
| Well if its to fight terrorism then I guess its ok. Errr I mean for the children.. Something tells me they are just saying what people want to hear in order to get their way because they are greedy.. | |
Formeister
join:2000-10-28
Somers, CT
clubs:
| reply to Doctor Olds
Well, I'm certainly glad I never purchased any hardware from Belkin and after this post I never will. Nor will I ever recommend their products to any of my customers. Regardless of their motives it's unimaginable that someone, somewhere in their corporation thought this was a *good* idea! The stink and stigma of this will haunt them forever to those who investigate and research computer products.
Thoroughly disgusted! | |
cyberthugin
join:2002-03-12
Kew Gardens, NY | Belkin not spammer anymore, Belkin is big brother big sister, haha, Belkin next is going to be anything and everything. | |
dbarc
join:2000-01-22
Fort Wayne, IN
| reply to Formeister
If they redirected once, it's too much. But once every 8 hours is disgusting. I have had clients use Belkin equipment, and will pass on the information about this move on their part.
I would question their liability. They were not redirecting based on your acceptance of any downloading of software, etc to your computer. And, if what I read correctly, they made no disclosure. IANAL, but I'd greatly question whether they are essentially hacking your internet data stream, which there are federal laws about. Remember, this is going on OUTSIDE your computer, much as if it was redirection at a edge router on the net installed by someone and done without knowledge. It's surreptitious and non disclosed. And as others said, there's much more than web pages that go through port 80 these days. I have a feeling they didn't pass this by their lawyers before they implemented it; and if they did, they should be looking for new lawyers. | |
|
