Sponsors please STOP this THEFT (part#1)
 

by now we are all well aware of these toolbars and trojans that rewrite pages with their ref codes..

If not ill explain a little.. there are many ways to do it , but lets say i hacked into gfy and altered the vbulletin database so when it displayed certain banners for say "TCG" it would add my webmaster ref code onto the end , randomly, only to third world ip's , ok maybe thats atricky example , but if you dont know what im talking about then you prob dont need to worry about it

Ok so we all know the problem exists , but im suprised more isn't being done to stop it..

Heres what sponsors can do to help.. and heres why you should be doing this..

When a good new sponsor comes onto the scene , many people notice better ratio's , some of this is due to the fact that these "trojans" and such havent had the time to signup to that sponsor yet so you arent getting "shaved" on your links to them..

Older / established sponsors ratios decline as more scammers rip off their affiliates and their affiliates move elsewhere..

So while you may notice a new "whale" , he might be a wolf in whales clothing :)

What can sponsors do about it.. ? look through your top 100 affiliates rferring urls or write a script and if you notice people making sales from other people's urls , you need to look into it..

Assure us you dont accept these practises , and that you do have security/staff in place to guard against such problems.. and if you dont , make plans to do so or watch as your affiliate base crumbles

gay. looks like I'll have to script all my ref codes...

I had a long talk with quite a few webmasters in Toronto this weekend about this, and I for one see stuff like this in my ratios. With enormous spikes in my signups with no changes to my traffic base, but yet joins are fluctuating by upwards of 75%. Its insane. I need this to stop asap.
WG

there are very large people making moves on this now

very large as in fat as shit? :upsidedow

Yet another flaw in an open affiliate program.
Invite only is so looking that much better.

yup , this is the new shave detector, he is paid in mcdonalds certificates for every scamming affiliate he finds, every sponsor needs one..

http://www.uni.uiuc.edu/library/blog...s/fastfood.jpg

these guys are smarter than that :) lots of money to throw around to fake a name for themselves , im sure a few of them are reading this thread as wee speak and have several "sonofsam" style friends to back them up :) , it just takes a few sneaky people working behind the scenes at different sponsors, and some guts..

I think many sponsors are afraid to disturb the whales even when they do look suspicious because all they see is an immediate drop in sales , but they dont see the whole picture..

Like if i had a whale who was stealing 10% of all my affiliates sales but i didnt realise that , all i would see is 400 sales going bye bye, when in reality they would just be credited to the real affiliates , and not vanish at all .

Yep, the toolbars are so common now. Affiliates must be loosing millions every month to ref code stealers

I'll pay 2k to anyone that can write me a toolbar like this.

























j/k

Truly believe that stealware/scumware is a growing problem. It seems the integrity of the sponsor is what is being tested.

I just figure it would be harder to hide in an invite only system. They may be able to get in, though typically with invite only it has a great deal less affiliates and you should be able to notice things faster and easier.

And unfortunately all my major sponsors are taking an absolute nosedive.
WG

True, and it's not very hard to detect this either, you could find the affiliates who get get signups with "stolen" traffic, with just some creative sql queries or some simple script...

I been saying this for years. But all the processors and webmasters say its not a problem at all. It is the number one reason why I will not deal in traffic or operate sites on the consumer end.


There have been way to many traffic jackings over the years one that comes to mind was Isearch and that whole Fiasco. There are many sublime app's out there just stealing traffic and re-writing affiliates codes.

Whats funny is that some of them that use this scumware are infact GFY advertisers hiding behind a clandestine outfit behind the scenes.

Oh noes!

Need to check it out,but if you already know some companies/affiliates doign it and you do not want to post their info here you can email me. I would appreciate that.

this might explain my horrid bangbros ratios....

interesting read and .......

Which is even more reason the sponsors need to get on it ASAP.

They may think it's not their problem, but it boils right down to them.

YOU know how to get traffic.
THEY(scumware) know how to steal traffic.
When you stop sending traffic to the sponsor, the Scumware guys stop making money through you, (for that sponsor anyway). Then the sponsor wonders why all the heavy traffic hitters have moved away.

If the sponsor can stay proactive, they can keep their heavy hitters, and help eliminate the theft.

Unfortunately AlienQ hit it on the head.. Sometimes the sponsor themselves are responsible, but, one step at a time might get things going, and maybe, some of these other 'sponsors' will come out in the wash..

And again from what I have seen on this board, getting a sponsor around here to even think of adding the options that Smokey talks about, would be next to impossible.

@SmokeyTheBear

Does mysite.com/intheviplink.php instead of http://www.inthevip.com/main.htm?id=myaffid help?

and thanks for an excellent thread :thumbsup

:)

i think so. fuck. I hope so

btw Smokey, if you know of any installs/spyware/toolbars that are affecting the main sponsor you mentioned in the start of the thread, please let me know. If they're not willing to stop it, I'm willing to go after my lost sales. I can tell you its definitely in the high 5 figures based on my downward trend sales figures.
WG

Not just sponsors and Processors.

Host providers to...

http://www.ialien.com/nohost.gif

If these hijackers were good, I'd redirect traffic at the processor (ccbill / paycom) level instead of the affiliate programs. Otherwise, it would be alot easier to see hits being shaved since they'd never be tracked which doesn't seem to be the case.
WG

eh? :error

WG - I do not even know why you would sit at a table with folks that hosted one of the internet's biggest traffic jacking scams...

I don't judge a hosting company based on its clients, but based on its performance and reliability. Now if isearch is jacking my traffic, please do contact me with some info about it (seriously).
WG

Not an error at all. WebAir proudly hosted Isearch when Porngraph was doing auto install's over night and day with Isearch. It stole millions of webmaster's traffic over night and damaged many webmaster's traffic trust.

Nope they didnt shut it down, they just let it keep happening...

Now ya can pin point all those companies and people as being sponsor's of this sort of activity.

ah shit...

Sounds like you've had much better luck than I. I just finished leaving them because of their performance, reliability, and cost.

I ended up getting twice as much bandwidth which procuded lower latencies, less hops, much quicker download speeds BUT at about 1/2 the price i paid at webair.

alien, you are like a broken record.

normally i'd try to damage your reputation in return but you do so well damaging it yourself.

I'm 100% certain that no such thing is or has happened.

Sperminator...

Just do a search here on GFY about Porngraph.
Do a little search on Isearch, right here in this very forum.

Then you will be shocked.

THE TRUTH IS OUT THERE.

Yo.

stop this theft!

Odd, I'm even growing my operation with webair (2 new servers last week) and everything is stable and doing well. Did you try contacting them about the issues you were having before leaving?
WG

LOL...

Dude go have yer fucking rep's throw more chairs threw windows and almost kill people at webmaster events. Or better yet send another off to take a swing at a processing company owner.:1orglaugh

We love people that can be trusted to operate good business unfortunatly the bad guys always make it hard, hide and dodge the facts.

Smokeys threads are always excellent. WG... if you find solid solutions please hit me up.
:2 cents:

This is his gay uncle Pete. He shaves one certificate for every 2 his nephew brings in. He is the McDonalds certificate pimp. Observe how this chain operation works =)

http://philip.greenspun.com/images/2...burger-2.4.jpg

I always wondered how Poor old hooper went from rags to riches over night and now has a nice condo penthouse in NY.

Or how John Albright magically produced NATS out of his ass...

Sponsors should have no reason NOT to check this. Their income (unless they were the one putting ref codes in) would not be effected, they would just be paying the same amount, but to different parties..

Thus, this could be a case of Webmasters ripping off other webmasters.

Dude.

Sponsors do not give a shit, they still get the sales.

Thats barking up the wrong tree entirely.

Ask some sponsors why they offer the encryption of thier links?
Oh thats right its great for SPAMMERS to hide thier identity!

Ya folks that think this industry is all fun and clean where everyone is "Cool", It still remains the filthiest smelliest pussy ever fucked by mankind.

Ya just goto look at it carefully and hold yer breath for the shock and horror as those around you have done nothing but steal from you in the first place.

I guess ya kid's do not really want to get into it.


Anyways!

Nice read.

smokey, is there anyway to hide your ref codes so they don't get over written? Does the header redirect work for this?

I hear the guys at Isearch drank Coca Cola. We should kill those motherfuckers at Coca Cola....:mad:
At a more serious note...Sponsors need to look for "new whales" and where there traffic is coming from. Its not hard. Dont make this thread into another one of your personal vendetta's.
This thread deserves better.
:2 cents:

hey everyone it was great day at the beach so i had to step out, glad this thread is getting the attention it deserves..

The header redirect will work in some cases , but not the majority , its much easier for sponsors to clean house on their end .. :thumbsup

But i have noticed increases since slowly shifting my traffic over to my own redirects

thanks for mentioning that i should have been clear because it could cause confusion , just for the record, i have no reason to believe tcg is being affected in any way ( other than the fact they are a big program and would be a likely target ) i dont use tcg so i dont pay too much attention to their ref codes ( although i do notice they seem to be quite notorious for showing up on these types of things , that could be due to many factors including that they are big , or that they look the other way , i dont wanna point any fingers where they dont need to be pointed so i'll leave it at that) I should also add that there are many other factors i think that affect ratio's payouts etc on big sponsors , that they need to pay more care too. I know of a guy who is ripping off tcg left right and center , and reported them for it several times, and tcg account is still open , so either they like being ripped off, they dont care , or they are involved ..

Yep, extracted it with a team of programmers.

not a bad idea, but this won't solve the issue... maybe in some rare cases where the spyware was coded by an amateur it will, but it won't in most cases... Like smokey said sponsors need to step up to the plate and fix it on their end, I don't think there is anything that can be done on the affiliate end to fix this...

work this shit out!