Attention: Program owners. Do you give a shit how you get your affiliate sales?

They sure DO replace cookies, how do you think they steal sales from others??

Who got in trouble for that, when and where? I'd like to see that. Please post a link.

Missie

Grounds for lawsuit against zango:

Interference in the contractual relationship between Sponsor and Affiliate.

Should be a slam-dunk. Somebody needs to organize the lawsuit. It's a shame there is not a business organization for Affiliate Marketing (adult, mainstream, or both), because they would be the natural ones to pursue it.

You hit the nail on the head. And that's not only grounds to sue 180Solutions but the sponsor(s) as well, especially if they knew about it and didn't do a thing to stop it.

Missie

are you 100% sure?

wanting to hear what zango had to say, i asked a rep today about this and he told me that they do NOT replace cookies or anything of the sort... he said that MetricsDirect's (aka 180solutions) advertising engine *may* popup the same site that the surfer gets linked to or open on their own.. but according to him and literature he provided, no referral information is overwritten.. and the reason for opening up a similar/competitor site is because of *their* affiliates which bid on keywords, urls, etc... (and yes they allow sponsors to bid on their own sites - which has interesting implications if referral info is overwritten...)

will i sent you an email yesterday wanting to discuss this with you but you haven't replied yet..

the rep informed me (and as spacekadet said) they were sued 2 years back for similar accusations... he then forwarded me 2 documents, the first of which is a management assertion that
1. they don't alter, manipulate, or delete 3rd party affiliate referral tracking info
2. they don't capture personal info
3. they don't access, collect or transmit data on the affiliate network servers

the second document is an statement from an independent 3rd party consultant which audited MetricsDirect's advertising engine "AMS".. and the report came up clean.. fyi, both documents date around spring of 2005

in light of that, i'd still like to get to the bottom of this... will/missie or anyone else interested i can pass on these documents to you... 16739924 is my icq..

we need to test if zango is actually rewriting referral info, as popping up another window of the same site proves nothing.. shouldn't be too hard.. just proxy the target site... kinda like "man in the middle" attack and intercept to see what really gets sent.. someone technical with some time up for an experiment?


ya short cookies is another 'problem' altogether...

Deem right! Thanks for introducing us Missie, you're a star and AffiliateFairPlay rocks!.

Great thread will76, keep bumping this peeps, I'd love to hear Zangos POV this, their hahahahahahahahahahahaha must be going crazy.

You could say that technically they dont overwrite cookies, but they over write the entire affiliate site witht their own so you say potatoe I say.....

I do have video of the pop ups in action, but the other programs involved did co-operate in freezing their affiliate - so no drama from me with these guys.

ParasiteWare sucks! What is being discussed here is officially known as "Cookie Stuffing".

Check this site out for more info on this issue: http://www.benedelman.org/

Many mainstream companies like ourselves oppose this heavily and do not tolerate it. However, sadly there are still a large number of companies that just plain and simple do not care and are only concerned with the bottom line.

AffiliateFairPlay is a great company. Kellie aka Ms. B is very knowledgeable in this. I sat in on a lecture she gave. Really informative!


-=Chipmunk=-

Hi all,

I'm Kellie from affiliatefairplay which Missie has mentioned (hi Missie & Ben!). She sent me a link to this thread asking for my input, so here I am.

I've been testing adware applications for about 5 years now focusing on how they interact in affiliate networks/programs and in general how they make their money. I believe I was the first to test and report publicly on 180Solutions behavior with affiliate links about 3 or so years ago. Adware issues can be confusing and convoluted at times, so I'd like to just touch base on a few things to help folks understand how these applications work and dispell some myths. Mainstream affiliate marketing have been dealing with these issues for years now.

As mentioned, there are many adware applications out there and they can behave differently. They also tend to change their behavior frequently and rapidly. This is somewhat related to how much public heat they are getting over a particular practice. I'll focus on 180Solutions, since that is the particular adware brought up here. But keep in mind, they are just one of many.

General Behavior:

There are 2 ends to 180Solutions business that get talked about a lot. First is their own affiliate program (ZangoCash). They have revshare and pay per install for folks who install their software. This is Zango's affiliates. Then they have CPV (cost per view) ad network. This is where you open an account with MetricsDirect, pick your kw targets and ad urls for those kw's and place bids for each ad view (i.e. pop up through 180Solutions software). It's completely up to the advertiser what the kw targets and ad urls are. Scarier is that you can let 180Solutions manage all this for you!

180Solutions has been a very active affiliate themselves in the past and operated on all the major mainstream affiliate networks as well as with independent programs, gaming industry and I'm sure adult industry. Over a year ago, they pulled out of being an affiliate themselves with all the major mainstream networks, focusing rather on their Ad network biz. I still see ads coming through their software periodcially where it appears that 180Solutions themselves is the actual affiliate. These are usually independent programs, but their own affiliate links are the minority of ads delivered.

This is technically true. But it is also misleading. Their software doesn't go in and change some else's affiliate links . It doesn't take the tracking cookie file and change in information in it. They don't go into network servers and alter tracking information. In fact, I don't know of any adware applications that do that off hand. Any of those things step into the area of where there is established laws which could possibly come into play. Far safer to stay in areas where there isn't established law. Also they can achieve the same end result without doing that and it's easier and more efficient programming of their software.

What does happen is their software scans every page loaded into the browser on the end users computer. They have a large database file installed on the end user's computer of all the kw their advertisers are bidding on. They scan the page being browsed for keyword matches in that database with content on the web page. They look at things like the page URL and Title tag for the matches. All this is done on the end users computer. If they find a match, the send those keywords to their servers. On their own servers they then check to see what ads are currently available (highest bids, advertisers daily spend caps, day targeting, geotargeting, etc). If an ad is available they then pop the the ad url in a new browser window.

What happens specifically to affiliate traffic and affiliate links depends completely on what keywords the advertisers is using and what their ad URL is. It can be as creative and the advertiser using 180Solutions. Here are just a few of some of the more common practices I've documented:

1. The keyword trigger is the Merchants URL, merchant.com. The Ad URL is an affiliate's tracking link. The result: The end user arrives at the merchant.com (or merchant.com/whateverpage.html as 180's targeting will pick up a partial match in the full URL being browsed). 180 then loads the affiliate's track link in a pop-up. Normal tracking of an affiliate happens. An affiliate 'click' is tracked to the affiliate running campaigns through 180Solution's Ad Network. This is what many call a forced click because the end user never physically clicked on the affiliate link. It doesn't matter how the traffic originally got the merchant.com. It could have been a direct type in in the browser to the merchant, a click from a PPCSE listing, an email link or a click from another affiliate. When the originating traffic was another affiliate, then the forced click results in the first affiliate's cookie being 'overwritten.' But this is done by normal affiliate tracking programming, not by the software physcially altering the first affiliate's link or cookie. The software NEVER goes near those. It's done by setting off the second affiliate's tracking AFTER the first one has tracked and uses normal affiliate tracking programming. The aff using 180Solution is now the 'last cookie in' which is Industry standards. First cookie in situations have been discussed numerous times in the past as a solution. There are a few networks and merchants who actually do first cookie in. However, it is not a generally accepted policy by most affiliates. And I can guarantee that if it did become the Standard in the Industry, then adware would just adapt and modify their programming to accomodate this (I'll not go into how they could do that technically, but there are some applications out there right now that are not impacted by first cookie in because of how their particular software behaves).

2. Keyword trigger is the Merchant's shopping cart/payment page. Ad Url is the affiliate's link. This results in a forced click for the affiliate using 180 as above except it doesn't happen until the end user is in the Merchant's shopping cart. This is what I call shopping cart pouching. They are setting their affiliate tracking once the end user is showing clear intentions of a possible purchase. Again it doesn't matter how the end user arrived at the merchant's site to begin with. This is rather efficient targeting by the affiliate of when to set their affiliate tracking, but it is also extremely bad behavior by the affiliate IMO.

3. Keyword trigger is merchant.com (or some variation) and Ad URL is a page on the affiliate's web site. The pop will contain the affiliate's web site. What happens next depends on what is on that particular affiliate's web page. Sometimes the page is a server redirect page containing the affiliate's link. End result still being a forced click of their affiliate link and the merchant's web site eventually shows in the pop. The reason some affiliates use this technique is some of the major mainstream networks saying affiliate's couldn't put their aff link directly into adware. It's just a work around to that rule. Sometimes the page will be an actual page on the affiliate's site. However they embed coding in the page which still automatically sets off their affiliate tracking code (js, iframes) in such a way that the merchant's web site isn't viewable. So all you would see on your screen is their web site, but they have tracked their affiliate. This is a 'hidden forced click.' Thankfully this particular practice is not nearly as common as it was a couple of years ago. Most Networks and merchants consider this clear cut fraud and is grounds for immediate termination (although they may let them back in after a month or so and the affiliate agrees to stop the practice). It does still happen though and I caught an affiliate recently doing this who was actually setting their affiliate link for 4 or 5 merchants this way through one pop up.

Those are a few examples of what can happen but hopefully you'll have a better understanding how 180Solutions software works. Other things I've seen is merchants popping on affiliate's sites, affiliates popping on affiliate's sites, affiliates popping on network sites (that one just seems suicidal to me but it takes all kinds), networks popping on networks, ppcse listing pages popping on anything. You name it, it can happen.

Obviously sponsors/merchants can be impacted just as much as affiliates. They are having their own organic and paid traffic being redirected (or mischanneled) into the affiliate channel for a paid commission. In the case of paid traffic redirection, they end up paying for the same end user twice. For affiliate's contacting sponsors about adware in their programs, it's been my own personal experience this fact gets the sponsor's/merchant's attention more quickly than anything else. ;)

I did do a few quick tests last night with just a couple of adware application only using some general adult industry kw searches. Through 180Solutions I got pop ups for FantasyFinder, Cams.com and AFF. Through SurfSideKick I got a pop for SexSeach.com. All pop ups were affiliate links.

Sorry for the long first post. Adware issues complex and I actually just skimmed the surface.

This is a very interesting thread I don't want to drag off-track, but there might be someone in it who knows enough to get (separately) into the less sensational but also serious topic of PPC "arbitrage". As I understand it, this is the practise of discovering that someone will pay more per click than traffic currently costs from other sources and basically - without risk - marrying up that source and destination.

That may seem to be what buying traffic is supposed to be about, except that both traffic sources (which almost always require openness about where their traffic will be directed) and sponsors (who anticipate that traffic will actually have clicked directly to them) are being cheated by the black-hat operators. Fully legitimate affiliates are suffering too, because of the way this practise pushes up PPC prices.

Thanks Kellie for posting and shedding some light on this for people here.

The more people who know and understand about this, the better for all of us affiliates.

Hi Ben!!!

Those who know me know how passionate I am about spyware. I DO care about my bottomline and you should care about yours too. We wouldn't knowingly let anyone come into our home every day and steal from us, why does it happen online and so few people care?

Missie

Kellie - thanks for the great post.
I strongly suggest everyone start looking into working on this together - with the gambling gone, they will be putting the focus on adult.

Thanks for posting and help explain in very good detail how this works.

The part I quoted above is what I have the biggest issue with. In my situation, to use one of my sponsors as an example, apparently someone has bid on the keyword " ifriends ". So I can no longer make a sale from ANYONE who has zango installed on their computer, to this sponsor (and the thousands of others they target).

When my TRAFFIC clicks one of MY links, MY cookie is set. Seconds later zango detects "ifriends" in the person's browser because after I set the cookie the next thing i do is send them to ifriend's website to signup. BUT, when zango detects ifriends in their browser Zango launchs their own window (pop under that the person may not even see) which sets zango's ifriends cookie. So *I* pay for the traffic. *I* send the person to ifriends to signup. This is MY Sale, but Zango gets credit for the sale because they set the cookie after mine? They DID NOTHING. the did not generate the lead/ traffic, they did not do anything to "sell" the person. The did not pay for the ad or create it. All the did was find a way to stamp their name to the sale seconds before it goes through.

I understand they don't "alter" my cookie. What they do is replace my cookie with theirs. 1+1 = 2 and 3-1 =2 I don't care how they get there, they are deliberately targeting my traffic and stealing my signups.

The point is they do ZERO to generate sales but yet they take all the credit when someone signups.

DO you people realize that everyone of us can not make 1 penny off of a zango infected computer. They have tons of sponsors targeted. The more and more people get affected the less chance we have to make money. Look what they did on myspace the last couple weeks. Search for " myspace and zango" and read the info there. No telling how many millions of computers were infected just from that in the last couple weeks. This company single handed has ristricted us from doing business in a deceptive way. None of the people who downloaded zango did so because they wanted to screw advertisers ? what service is it doing to the end user to pop under a page to a site the user is already on ?????? Someone explain that to me.

This is deliberate and deceptive and has to be illegal, at the very least they should be liable in a civil case.

thanks for shedding light onto this kellie..

going on 3 hours sleep i had to read your example twice.. the term "affiliate" being applied to both parties (merchants original referrer and 180solution's ppc advertiser who buys the impression) had me going in circles.. lol

if what you say is true then indeed 180solutions should be drawn and quartered cause their statement that "they don't rewrite cookies" as interpreted by any lay person means "they don't do anything unscrupulous"... indeed misleading.. a more accurate statement would be "they don't rewrite client side referral info.. BUT alls fair if we send in our cookie 2 seconds after yours..."

i see how this is the tip of the gray region.. most people can see overwriting referral info client side is criminal and clearly illegal.. but this problem is in the ethical gray region of "well, how long do i wait before i chase your cookie?".. (on an related issue, similar issue as sponsors setting 1 day cookies.. ).. seems like they're exploiting the merchants simplistic referrer tracking technology/algorithm - ie imprecise tracking of a session... eg. if a surfer arrives at merchant.com via affiliate 1.. affiliate 1 should get credit for any purchases made by said surfer for the entire duration that they're on merchant.com, IRREGARDLESS of any subsequent tracking info sent in to merchant.com by affiliate 2, affiliate 3, etc...

a more nefarious, grayer area (perhaps unanswerable) question is... what if it was affiliate1 who generated the lead but couldn't close the deal cause the surfer wasn't ready to buy.. but a few days later re-introduced to the same merchant by affiliate2? this time around the surfer has had enough time mull over merchant.com and decides now to produce his visa after he's had a few days thought... (like when someone opens a jar after you try..'i loosened it for you'...lol)

anyways, i'll be contacting my zango rep to see what his response is to my new information.. (after i get some sleep!)..

seems to me that if enough noise is made, an answer will surface... either legally (class action law suit) or the industry evolves an answer... (ie NATS to shaving)...

hopefully the industry is listening..




ok time for bed

I have detected several accounts being used to the same sponsor, looks like some sort of rotation. Who knows they all could be them and they spread out their sales incase 1 or 2 accounts gets banned they still get paid on the other ones. I did notice one of the account names was 180solutions, so i would think that is most likely their account. Anyway, if we can get a case going I am sure subpoenas will uncover which accounts belonged to who.

LOLOL Not sure what kind of answer you expect to get, as long as you don't expect the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. I'll bet that you'll get a lot of dancing around the bush.

Ask Kellie to test your program and provide you with a video of how zango behaves on your link(s). You won't need to contact them for answers, the video will show you exactly what happens when they pop on your site(s).
It will open your eyes for sure, especially if it's one of your own ads rather than coming from an affiliate site.

That is usually what gets sponsors to wake up, when they see that THEY are the ones getting ripped off.

Missie

I will be making a lot of noise, so the affiliate companies can't say they didnt know about this.

you can hit them where it hurts (in the pocket) or get all of the sponsors to contact them and publicly block them from their affiliate programs, or do both.

Even worse, the ONLY person who would get credit for the sale in that instance would be the person bidding on clicks from the installer if I followed this, which I think I did.

So if the surfer has such a program installed (whether they are aware of it or not), then any link appearing in their browser with the target keywords (whether typed in, click from affiliate1's link, redirect with affiliate1000's link etc.), the person bidding on the keyword would always get the sale credit.

You got it! The affiliate whose site is displayed by the spyware application gets the sale. Forced click = cookie overwritten = last cookie gets the sale = spyware scum affiliate gets credit.

I know that zango/180solutions is what is being talked about here, but don't forget that's only one company and one program. There are hundreds of them out there that do the exact same thing. So don't think for a minute that because zango doesn't target you that you're free and clear of these scums. There might be a dozen others that target you and steal from you every day.

Missie

yes they do. It is the nature of how cookies work. When you come to my website and click a link to my sponsor it sets a cookie on your computer. If you were to edit that cookie you will see information there, like my account code, etc. Now when zango pops under a window that sets a cookie to the same site, if you go back to your cookies folder and open the same cookie, you see their affiliate info there. Whatever you want to call it, my cookie is altered, deleted, replaced, what the hell ever, it is gone and their cookie is there.

I have recorded this, so i have documention of it happening. I set the cookie on my computer and redirect the person to yahoo.com for example, no zango page pops up. When you edit the cookie you see my account info there. BUt when i set the cookie and then redirect the person to my sponsor's site, a zango page pops up for the same sponsor. When you go back to your cookies and open that one, their affiliate info is now in that cookie and your information is gone.

All paid advertising is affected but think about the people who are bidding on keywords there and paying, $1 for a click for webcam for example. Think of all of the money that they are being cheated out of. Every person who has zango installed that clicks one of their ads on google, they have 0 ZERO chance to make a sale from that person. This hurts google as well. How many people have bought ads on their site and lost money and stopped buying from them. How much more money or return on your investment do you think you could have gotten if it would have been a fair playing field and you would have received credit for all of your sales. This affects not only sponsors and affiliates but also people who sell ad space.

Thanks. Nothing pissed me off more then someone stealing from me. Sometimes it is as obvious as someone breaking in your home, other times, like this, you have someone stealing from you and it is hard to even notice what is going on.

Here is their offical response (from their website): http://www.zango.com/destination/cor...Assistant.aspx


A Smarter Way to Search
Zango Search Assistant recognizes keywords from your Internet browser to display ads for matching products and services from our advertisers. The Search Assistant displays advertiser websites that are directly related to websites you visit or keywords you search for ? our advertisements are useful because they are relevant to your search.

The are not shy about it, they state it right there. " display ads for matching products or services" So lets ad a "product" to their statement and add a little more truth to it...

A Smarter Way to Search
Zango Search Assistant recognizes the word "ifriends" from your Internet browser to display ads for "ifriends" from our advertisers to get credit for the sale. The Search Assistant displays advertiser websites that are exactly the same as website you are visiting ? our advertisements are useful because they overwrite the code of the person who really sent you there and allow our advertisers to make all the money. The more our advertisers make the more we make. What do you care, you are on that site already, and it doesn't cost you anything.

special place in hell for people like this.

Damn good thread lets keep this going

Will76: This is the bottom line and the answer to the problem. If you want to recover your income and other affiliates then you should be changing your policy regarding first cookies. You can't stop the problem, but maybe with your clickcash influence you can solve it by changing the cookie policy.

ummm... this is what ZANGO said...

here is the response from ZANGO and below that is the e-mail I wrote to them yesterday:

Thanks for your note, Mr. Hoffman.

I certainly understand your concerns with the rumors that you mentioned. When we heard these same rumors more than two years ago, we hired an outside auditing firm to analyze our program's behavior to ensure that such activity was not occurring. After reviewing our programs, the IM Services auditing firm confirmed that our programs indeed do not interfere with affiliate commissions.

If you have any further questions on this or any other matter, please feel free to contact me.

Thanks,

Cory Magnus
Senior Manager of Industry Affairs
Zango
E: [email protected]
P: 425.279.1205 | F: 425.279.1199
www.zango.com

Read our blog at http://blog.zango.com



From: evulvMEDIA [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Tuesday, October 03, 2006 11:51 PM
To: Steve Stratz; Cory Magnus
Subject: a concern regarding Zango software


Dear Mr. Stratz and Mr. Magnus:

I am an adult webmaster. Part of my business is advertising adult websites and enticing Internet surfers to click on advertisements for my affiliated business partners ("Sponsors"). I am paid a commission when Internet surfers purchase products and/or memberships from the Sponsors sites.

It has been rumored that your software ("zango"), when installed, interferes in the contractual relationship between my Sponsors and I, specifically by intercepting the communication that occurs when a user clicks on a Sponsor link on one of my websites and then redirecting that communication through a link set up by your company with that same Sponsor. The end result of that interference would be that your company is paid the commission that is due to me.

I have investigated your website and have seen no disclosure that your software operates in this manner. As I am sure that your company would not interfere in the contractual relationships between others, I would like you to kindly set the record straight.

Specifically, I would like for you to confirm that your software does not interfere in the business relationship and flow of commissions between other Internet companies.

Sincerely,
Ray Hoffman

--
Ray Hoffman
evulvMEDIA, Santa Monica, California, U.S.A.
ICQ 301-031-384, on myspace
www.evulv.com

very interesting thread I will just bump it

I'm not surprised and that's exactly what I would have expected from them.

I wish Kellie had permission from other sponsors to post videos that show how it's done. You'd see that cookies DO get replaced and zango claims the sale every time.

Ben's site is huge but let me go fetch some links from his site. I know he's got many videos there, I hope he has some from 180.

Missie

I deleted all the links because it still won't let me post them, even in a quoted post.

Unfortunately all I can find is stuff from February of this year. But it's still self explanatory. Ben has been more involved in research for lawsuits against spyware. If that's what you plan to do, he might be the one you want to contact. Although Kellie from affiliatefairplay dot com can do the same for you.

Here's the link to Ben's site, sorry for the broken link but...

benedelman dot org/news/022006-1.html

Scroll down to read about 180solutions and how they operate. They haven't changed a bit over the years, it's just the story of the spin they give you that changes. But results are always the same. They love to play the "victims".

Missie

Hi Chipmunk!! Good to see ya again.

I feel your pain Will. The main reason I posted the distinction is for 2 reasons. First is in response to the email claims by 180 posted by islopath that Zango doesn't "1. they don't alter, manipulate, or delete 3rd party affiliate referral tracking info". Zango is being very careful in their terminology. And they are doing this intentionally.

You are ABSOLUTELY correct the end result for you is the exact same. But from Zango's prespective, how they defend their business publicly they are taking the serious public relations spin road. And I have to say that Zango has a very good public relations company working for them. And they have been quite successful in how they spin. So when I have the chance to debunk their spin, I do. Because you are right in that you still got to the #2 didn't you?

The second reason I posted such detail is because of some of the prior posts talking about possible solutions and those were based what seemed to be the assumption the cookie/tracking itself was being altered by the adware. Those solutions wouldn't work because that's not how the adware works.

Come on Missie... 4 more posts! lol

So how much does Kellie charge to test your sites?

Hey please forward me that letter. I would like to start collecting all documention that any of you here receive from them, please include headers, etc..


rumors LOL thats sad he is trying to spin it.

"our programs indeed do not interfere with affiliate commissions. "

I have a video documented here that says otherwise and several other people that have experienced the same thing.

Who can get info on this company. I want to know about this "other" kawsuit.

I'm trying!!!!!!! LOL Once I reach 30 posts I can relax.

That's really for Kellie to answer. Contact her directly or if she reads this (and I'm pretty sure she will - I hope I didn't get her addicted to yet another forum! LOL) she might contact you herself.

Missie

i dont think you have enough post. not sure how many you need though to post links,,,, anyway if you have icq or email see my sig i will post anything you have if you can't.

Glad you guys have video as well. From what I can see they are feeling the heat and they have changed a few things since i first reported this here. Too bad for them they can't change what i recorded. the more evidence we have the better. video doesn't lie.

Will,

Contact Ben via his site. I know he's got tons of stuff that he doesn't publish. Give him links to this forum related to spyware. He might be able to provide you with a lot more information on 180.

Missie

You would think so no? But that hasn't seemed to be the case necessarily. It would seem that laws and rules that apply to offline commerce don't necessarily carry over onto the Internet. Or at least law enforcement agencies feel they need separate laws. When I found WhenU popping on my own shopping cart back in early 2001 (I think it was), I immediately picked up the phone and called the CyberCrimes division of my AGs office. They didn't like it, but felt there was no existing laws for them to do anything. They were waiting for the laws.

There have been several lawsuits over the years now. The lawsuits approached it from several different legal avenues. Many cases were settled. The cases that didn't settle have had mixed results going both ways. There hasn't been any clear cut legal precedent set at this time.

Several states have since enacted antispyware legislation. What is covered in these laws varies from state to state. The first state to pass such a law was Utah. It addressed true spyware (i.e. collecting PPI and things like credit card/banking information), but it also tried to address the commerce end of the adware problem by basically saying they could have their software pop on someone else's web site on computers in UT. When the law was signed, affiliates in mainstream were overjoyed. They need the other site to pop on, so if they can't do that then problem solved! Or at least to a large extent. WhenU immediately sued the State of UT, the governor of UT and whoever else saying the law violated their Constitutional rights. They said it violated their...get this...First Admendment Rights. And well they won. UT revised the bill removing that clause from the bill. The law is a strange place at times.

Lawsuits are a sticky wicket. Especially when there is not clear cut law in place. I will say from my own discussions with attorneys that class actions are not necessarily easy suits to bring forth. IANAL, but from my discussions with attorneys their opinion the best possible winnable case from the affiliate's perspective was not against the adware company and it was civil in nature. I've actually been involved in more than one attempt at a class action. At the end of the day, when it came down to the knuckle knocking as to what is involved (with such issues as disclosure by both parties) and who the best case would be against (sponsor/merchants), affiliates were not willing to follow through. That's all just my own personal experience though. ;)

A fascinating thread here.
thanks for starting it Will, and thanks to the others who have posted all the detailed info as well.

I find it very interesting and extremely troubling that more of the major sponsors haven't made any kind of statement in this thread, I appreciate those that have and I am an affiliate of 2 of them so thats a plus, but obviously sponsors being attentive to this issue is only a portion of the solution, we have to find a way to overcome this either through legal action or/and some type of technology to combat these thieves and their methods.

Missie, you have reached the 30 post mark so you should be able to post links now

That's a real shame. I wouldn't care who I go after, sponsors, merchants, affiliates, or adwhores (love that Mike!) themselves. Hell, I'd sue them all if I could!

If affiliates start suing merchants/sponsors for breach of contract because of spyware applications and win, it sure would send the message real quick to others who are doing the same.

You sue another affiliate and win and you could financially ruin them for life. That would scare other scumbags who are too lazy to do their own work and find it easier to just steal the sales. Is it worth the risk?

Missie

oops double post!

also in light of the fact that there seem to be quite a few posters here on GFY spamming zango's aff program to unsuspecting webmasters, I think we should work on getting Lens and TD to block their ability to do that here.

Topbucks has been on this issue for quite a while and did it long before affiliates were even aware of the problem.

OK, folks, here is a plan of attack:

FIRST:

The best bet with a court case is to have major sponsors as Plantiffs and the issue be PPC hijacking. It's pretty hard to see where there is any gray area here, and the major sponsors who do PPC on Google will be very eager I'm sure to stop this. Especially since it is likely going to become a bigger issue.

So sombody needs to step forward and research this, but with a particular focus: Get video documentation of how PPC clicks were hijacked from major sponsors. Then approach the sponsors (or maybe one of the sponsors takes this initiative) with this information. Try to get them all to go after ZANGO in court to recover damages directly related to the PPC hijacking.

SECOND:

Get in touch with Too Much Media / NATS, CCBill, and the major adult dating and webcam sponsors. This will not cover every sponsor in the industry, but it will cover most of them. Make them aware of the problem. Here is one possible solution that doesn't solve the problem but makes it less easier for affiliates and owners to get screwed:

Insert a random delay, say between 30 seconds and 1 hour, into visitor tracking. During this delay period, a tracked visitor cannot be reassigned.

There is likely a better solution from a technical standpoint, though- in particular, I could imagine a "spyware filtering" mechanism that would look for affiliates who attempt immediate visitor assignment changes. The technology could simply disable affiliates who do this.

THIRD (and this is a big one):

Demonstrate to Sponsors the magnitude of the problem and the fact that it is likely to quickly get worse. Show them that if they take a stand against this sort of spyware, they can use the fact that they are "SPYWARE-PROOF" (or a like term) to their competetive advantage. That would be a wonderful thing to hear from an affiliate standpoint,


On a larger-scale note, we really need a trade group to handle issues like this. That same trade group should have also distanced the industry from ventures like Red Rose Stories and furthered the image of adult as a law-abiding and up-and-up business (if not a respectable business).

The closest thing we have is the FSC. I would be in for abandoning the FSC for a trade group with a more encompassing focus like this.

Get Larry Flynt to speak up on this. After all, Hustler did find spyware in their program. He's vocal enough on issues related to this industry.

What about Playboy?

Vivid?

Penthouse?

Lexington Steele - Peter North - BrainCash

Get big names involved that are easily recognizable in the real world. Not talking about affiliate managers here, but the owners of the programs.

Missie

Those, in most likelihood, are not all affiliate IDs belonging to 180Solutions. I think Missie mentioned from Ben's report 176 IDs for them found. That information in Ben's report has been widely misunderstood. Those were 176 IDs (or however many it was) he found coming through their software for BF, LS, CJ and PFX. All most all of those IDs belonged to affiliates who were running ads through 180Solutions software and not 180Solutions themselves.

Even when an affiliate just uses their affiliate link as the pop up URL so all I really have is an unknown aff id, I'd say 85% of the time I'm eventually able to track down who really belongs to that ID. And it's usually not 180Solutions. Even when you see tags referencing 180 in the URL, many times it's just the affiliate using a parameter to track the traffic source for their own internal stats.

The problem would be much easier to control if all those Ids did belong to 180 themselves. But when it's a revolving door of any affiliate with $50 being able to open an account with 180 and run campaigns, it's entirely different beast to monitor.

IMO, 180 has intentionally severely cut back on what they are doing as an affiliate themselves. If you read the 180Solutions Advertiser TOS (you got to dig on their site to find it), you'll get a clue. The upshot, and I'm definitely paraphrasing here, is that if the shit ever does hit the fan from a legal standpoint it's the advertiser using their service and not them who is responsible. Their stance seems to be along the line of what the P2P apps did. They just provide the technology and their advertisers not them who is responsible for how it's being used.

Well not 100% of the time. They have alogrithms and timers built into the software for when an ad will pop and what ad will pop. I won't necessarily get a pop up every test just because a kw is being bid on. They also allow day targeting now, so an advertiser can stipulate certain hours of the day they want their ads to pop. A very rough estimate is about 5 minutes has to pass before another pop up will happen for the same kw trigger. But again there are many factors that come into play. Neverless, it can be a significant impact.

What happens to the cookie is correct, but Zango software didn't do it. The affiliate Network changed the IDs. Because that's the way affiliate networks track. If you did the same thing except clicked on an affiliate link from another web site, you'd see the same thing with the cookie. Is that just semantics? Maybe, but it's a very important distinction from a legal standpoint. And again from how Zango is able to publicly defend their business practices. Because to say Zango themselves altered the cookie is factually not correct from a very technical standpoint. What is accurate however is that whatever affiliate that ID belonged to used Zango's software to exploit the affiliate tracking system to record their 'click' when no actual true end user physical click happened. And Zango's software and business facilitates such exploitation. And last time I checked Affiliate Marketing is still performance based, so that true physical click is key in a performance based model. All that doesn't mean you weren't scooped out of your sale.

Thanks Kellie for explaining the 170 ID's. I remember posting something about this on the Regnow forum a few years ago when I had found MetricsDirect as one of their top affiliates. Shit had hit the fan on their board and they had threatened to ban me. I reposted this from memory today.

That's right and all TOS say that a sale is payable to you if it originates from a click on one of your links. The wording is different in most programs, but that's what they all say. In cases of the cookie being overwritten without a physical click from the surfer and replaced by the cookie of affiliates who use adware, this becomes a legal issue because the sale came from a physical click YOUR link.

That's my opinion anyway.

Missie

I remember that audit. :D It came on the heels of them catching a lot of public heat originating from the mainstream affiliate community. They came out very publicly saying they were hiring PriceWaterHouse to do the audit. Then silence for a couple of months. The audit came out much more quietly and it wasn't done by PriceWaterHouse. I don't think I ever saw them same publicly why the change from such a reputable auditer. I also never saw actually what was being audited and the criteria which was used to show the no interference with affiliate commissions happened. What exactly was considered interference? Zango spin. Gotta love it. Kind of like their move when they were taking a lot of heat for stealth installs of Zango by CDT through CDT's porn sites. Zango's reaction to it? To 'control' the rogue affiliate (CDT), they bought the company. ROFL.

I remember Cory also. I was engaged in a public Q&A with him on another forum to discuss 180's practices a couple of years ago. He wound up admitting some things their software was doing at the time that he probably really shouldn't have. They since stopped that particular one.

Well I can do whatever I want with my own videos (eg those from my own research outside of private consulting). My policy is not to publicly post such videos (particulary on high traffic sites) involving affiliate's web sites. That's just out of respect for affiliates. Many affiliates are very particular about the knowlege of their web sites. ;) Also, there have been more than one case where the victimized affiliate experienced retaliation from the offending affiliate after some public 'outing'. So I tend to lean towards caution and respecting the privacy of the innocent affiliate. I've always only posted videos and such that contained aff web sites with the express consent from the owner of the web site. Don't know if you've noticed or not Missie, but on my service I blur out the URL's and any other identifying elements on the affiliate's site in the screen shots I post. Some of these companies don't play nicely in the sandbox. I know from first hand experience. I had someone literally knock on my front door who was sent by an adware company because they were 'displeased' with posts I'd made about their software in a forum. Never did tell me exactly what they had an issue with. But somehow I don't think that was the real point of the visit. I wasn't the only one who got the visit either. So I just don't post vids of aff traffic being popped on without expressed consent from the affiliate receiving the pop and they understand the full possible implications of such a public posting.

I remember reading about those visits on ABW.

Years ago, I used to have a site that exposed online business/affiliate program scams and sites that downloaded spyware. I named them and reported the outcomes of my conversations with them. I had run-ins with quite a few of them. I had my phone number on the site. I started getting calls, some were threatening, at all hours of the day and night. It's all gone now.

My fight against spyware has never stopped though. It still affects MY bottomline.

Missie

Everyone always says there is no money in porn. If you make any money at all from selling porn on line you know that that is complete bullshit. There is money to be made but there are only so many people willing to pay for porn anymore.

When I tell some people what I do they say "people really pay for porn?". These are the people that understand computers and the internet. They know that they can go to any torrent site or p2p program and download whatever they want for free (which is another problem in itself). It's too damn hard to get these people to buy anything. This is not the target market.

The people that are willing to spend money on porn are either honest people that don't want to steal from anyone or people that can't figure out torrents or "all that high tech stuff". They just want good porn and are willing to get out there credit card to avoid all the crappy free sites that just don't show the good stuff. The problem lies with the second type of person.

The people that don't understand computers and the internet all that much also don't understand spyware/adware. These people are the ones who are willing to pay for porn because they don't know how to steal it, but they are also the ones who won't realize that they have been infected with spyware. These are the best costumers and they are being stolen from us.

There is obviously money in porn or none of us would be here, but there are only so many people that are left to sell it to. These people that are left are also the people more likely to get infected with this shit and therefore there is even a smaller piece of the pie for all of us to compete for. The small slice of pie we are all going after is slowly shrinking. This is why everyone says there is no money in porn anymore.

Stop these thieves and we will all have a bigger slice of the pie to try and get a piece of.

actually, my zango rep was pretty upfront about it and gave me straight up answers to my questions... in a nutshell, what kellie claimed above regarding 180/zango popping up the exact same site, thus superseding the first referrer's info server side, is absolutely true.. he didn't deny it.. (i guess the difference between my zango response and evulvmedia's letter may be that my questions were exact and couldn't be misconstrued)

and as i alluded to above, this adds "interesting implications" because zango permits sponsors to bid on their own sites!!!... doesn't take a rocket scientist to see what's wrong with that picture..

as for a solution, i can see kellie's perspective that nailing them in court may be difficult for a number of reasons: burden of proof, lack of unity/resolve on the part of affiliates/sponsors, immature internet regulations/laws (likely stemming from ignorance), etc.. while not necessarily impossible, i think a more probable solution would be self-regulation.. similar to how many sponsors utilize NATS because of their 'no shave' reputation, i believe something similar may surface for this "piggy-back-cookie-stomping" issue.. (pssst NATS... u guys listening?)

will, seems like we're playing a lot of icq tag... give email a try, might have more luck.. with regards to legal action, u gonna set up a mailing list for those interested? i don't check gfy religiously, unfortunately..

ok, i'm off to remove all my zango promotions now and do a little surfer education..

I think your zango rep will be fired after this.

Like Kellie said, 180Solutions isn't stupid and they know how to give a good spin on things and turn things to their advantage. They've been doing it for years. They have a lot of experience behind them...

You have to read between the lines. Unfortunately, someone who does NOT understand how it works to begin with, will believe what they say because they're not really lying, they're just twisting or dancing around the truth. Good for you for asking the right questions.

I talked about that in one of the threads. Some sponsors justify stealing sales from their own affiliates to minimize the amount of payouts they have to pay.

Missie

For a civil case you don't have the burden of proof you need for a criminal case so that plus the criminal laws being unclear I think it would be best to go at them from a civil suit, class action. I know they have been sued from users but I don't know of any lawsuits where they have been sued by other advertisers. Regardless if there is a law on the books or not, if it smells like shit looks like shit taste like shit, it's shit. Their intent is clear as day. I don't see how they could defend themselves and win from this type of lawsuit.

thats just a bandaide IMO. as long as these sponsors keep sending the spyware advertisers checks in the mail, they will keep doing it.

You can change, they will find a way around it. If you cut off the money, it will stop. Thats true for everything.