cookie stuffer faces 20 years and $250k fine...
 

This post/story about a serious case of cookie stuffing might be more than two years old but it has recently resurfaced as the defendant (Shawn Hogan) has pleaded guilty to the charges brought before him and is about to face some very big penalties (up to 20 years in prison and fines of approx $250k).

A couple of useful posts and more information on this story;

• The original post from 2012 on Kelly Stevens' (Leading online fraud detective) blog; http://www.revenews....ookie-stuffing/
• A recent post from the Affiliate Fairplay site; http://www.affiliate...ffing-case.html2

any networks / merchants on here been a victim to this kind of skullduggery?

travs from this very forum should take note!

I was hoping this thread was going to be about panty stuffing, only with chocolate Chip cookies instead :(

The guy would be better off if he got drunk and drove his truck through a playground full of handicapped children.

BTW... Truncated links are truncated

I used to sit next to a Cookie Stuffer in an IT job, as soon as nobody was looking he'd do his own stuff, he used to Cookie Stuff eBay from forums (not his forums), he'd normally make around $500 before getting banned, then he'd start again with a new account. Eventually he got fed up of getting banned. I suspect these days they'd come down on him hard.

People still do that shit? Heh

Yeah it's called a LiveJasmin popunder on every tube site. :winkwink:

forgive an old pornographer. But what is cookie stuffing ?

In all seriousness there are a good few others at it too...

Some broken images are legit, but most I look at are not... :2 cents:

having a go here , but not 100% sure myself.

when you visit websites, through affiliate links for example, cookies get stored on your computer so you can be tracked if you purchase something and the affiliate can be credited with a sale.

What cookie stuffers do is post on forums and other sites to overwrite old existing cookies with theirs, so instead of the affiliate legitimately getting the sale the cookie stuffer got it.

For example in someones signature on this vbulletin forum the use of html is allowed, people can inject some code so if anyone visits a thread where the cookie stuffer posted then that cookie gets inserted automatically literally just by visiting the thread.

some do it to get round limited time cookie conditions, but most of the time its not as innocent and just plain cuntishness.

some clever guy posted a nifty tool in warrior forum for amazon that extends cookie duration. seems legit; http://www.warriorforum.com/warrior-...r-plugins.html

Just google "how to cookie stuff using image tags" and you'll see what is being discussed re broken images...

Yes he stuffs tubecamgirl program too with his broken images, and his posts looks like a bot.

All you have to do with Amazon to get the 90 day cookie is use a link that goes to the add to basket page. Customer puts something in their basket and you get the longer cookie - they don't even have to pay for it straight away.

more bullshit "examples" being set and putting people away for something that no one will care about and be commonplace in a few years.

Why is cookie stuffing illegal?

because it rips of legitimate affiliates / affiliate program owners?

Let me rephrase - yes it's morally wrong. But why is it *illegal*? THey actually have a law specific to cookie stuffing or does it fall under something else?

unlikely, they probably just call it "fraud"...

if the OP would fix the links we could read up on what exactly happened... :helpme

the 2 links in the original post were:

http://www.revenews.com/affiliate-ma...okie-stuffing/
http://www.affiliatefairplay.com/res...fing-case.html

Isn't he the digital point owner?

Yeah that's DigitalPoint's owner Shawn Hogan.

Up to 20 years in prison for that.... wow...

The only reason this has gone so is because of the sums of money involved.

Quoted from the second link above: http://www.affiliatefairplay.com/res...fing-case.html

"You must actually send the consumer to the merchant's site not just have a "click" track for the affiliate link."

"If you are cookie stuffing, legally it is wire fraud. "

How are they able to set cookies on third party domains?

And wire fraud is a federal offense with strict minimum sentencing guidelines.

.

He made 15million from ebay alone, I wonder how much he made in total from stuffing as I bet he did it for more than one sponsor.

they don't., they just use iframes or some image or flash technique to load affiliate link.

Its very easy to catch cookie stuffing these days just by looking at stats.

cookie stuffing is very wrong, but 20 years is too much, i guess it depends on money involved in the fraud.

He hasn't sentenced to 20 years yet, doubt he will get 20 years, maybe a few years on probation.

I'm not 100% sure of the mechanics of how it was done. In this case they (the accused) set E-Bay cookies with their affiliate code through third party unrelated sites without actually sending the consumers to E-Bay, then if the consumer went to E-Bay they got credit for the traffic.

I'm sure others here could add more of how this was done but that's what I got from my reading.

He was a shady fucker scamming money. Being a federal crime he just might get a lot of years. Rightfully so.

lets probably not provide too many specifics, some idiots in this thread will see "He made 15million from ebay alone" and will setup the exact same scam... :1orglaugh:1orglaugh

There are several people that cookie stuff for amazon (they do things to counter it but it still happens), people post something on craigslist saying it's free and then have a link to click through that sends their browser on a wild goose chase.

Shawn Hogan is bright and from the fact he let's file lockers post on his site for their services, shows isn't above making a buck. Recall uploaded.net payed $10k to list on Wjunction? I'm sure there is something similar with Hogan going on.

People cookie stuff all the time. I know there are a couple shitty nicks on here that run on auto pilot and make a post like "oh nooos" or "this better be good", something that can almost play off as neutral garbage.

There are plenty of programs out there that allow timed forum posting across hundreds of forums if used properly. This is what the effective file locker uploaders do to make money (not nearly as much and not for long).

Spamming can still be effective if done right, but people who solely rely on these illegitimate means tend to not be very skilled at writing effective copyright and lack the ability for creative and engaging content that is unique.