Annoyance Dept: Microsoft, Earthlink, Charter, and Search Typo Redirection Pages

[mandy]

Assume for a second that you're among the almost 80% of people that use Internet Explorer to surf the web. You're looking for Lexus Financial Services. You know that their actual domain name is LexusFinancial.com. But for some reason you enter Lexus-Financail.com into your browser bar - and you're in good company, because millions of people mistype domain names every day...

As the domain Lexus-Financail.com doesn't actually exist, Internet Explorer in its default configuration sends you to Live Search, which offers you two related terms: Lexus Financial and Lexus Financial Services...

If you click on either of these links, you're taken to a Live Search Results Page filled with PPC (pay per click) ads...

full article: http://www.dailydomainer.com/200784-micr...lions.html

Today, if you use EarthLink internet access, when you mis-type the URL of the web site you were trying to find, or if the site no longer exists...
Last week EarthLink started rolling out a new system for handling certain specific types of browser errors on our network. You'll only see it in the fourth case listed above. It serves you a page with suggestions for what site you might have been looking for, along with the ability to search using Yahoo. It also has an ad on it. We think that for the vast majority of users who end up in bucket "d", this is a better experience because it helps them to get where they are going quicker, and doesn't leave them with a dead end. In addition, EarthLink will generate revenue from the page.

full article: http://blogs.earthlink.net/2006/08/handl...ains_1.php

[regic]

I hate Earthlink's #$@!@!@$% redirect page. 

[bargainbloodhound]

I'm ready to drop Earthlink because of that.  :

[BellisimaJ.]

I have Comcast .....

[amy]

[quote author=bargainbloodhound link=topic=8120.msg45402#msg45402 date=1172711214]
I'm ready to drop Earthlink because of that.  :
[/quote]

We dumped Earthlink Cable last week.

[amy]

Add Road Runner to the list of ISPs that redirect on typos (i.e. hijack browsers) 

[regic]

[quote author=amy link=topic=8120.msg68545#msg68545 date=1205350166]
Add Road Runner to the list of ISPs that redirect on typos (i.e. hijack browsers) 
[/quote]

They started doing it last month.

Time Warner and Road Runner Attempting to Monetize by Hijacking DNS
http://www.billhartzer.com/pages/time-wa...hijacking/

edit-instructions for opting out
http://rgov.org/road-runners-dns-wildcard
opt out here:
http://ww23.rr.com/prefs.php

[mandy]

Related: security expert says ISP search redirection pages are putting users at risk of attack

Comcast, Verizon and at least 70 other internet service providers are putting their customers at serious risk in their quest to make money from mistyped web addresses, security researcher Dan Kaminsky says.

Speaking at the ToorCon security conference in Seattle, Kaminsky demonstrated an exploit class he dubbed PiTMA, short for provider-in-the-middle attacks. A variation of man-in-the-middle attacks, it stole authentication cookies and injected arbitrary content into trusted web pages by exploiting weaknesses in an ad server Earthlink used when returning results for non-existent addresses...

full article: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/04/20/...t_toorcon/

Seeking to make money from mistyped website names, some of the United States' largest ISPs instead created a massive security hole that allowed hackers to use web addresses owned by eBay, PayPal, Google and Yahoo, and virtually any other large site.

The vulnerability was a dream scenario for phishers and cyber attackers looking for convincing platforms to distribute fake websites or malicious code...

full article: http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2008/04...-page.html

[rose]

Earthlink fixed their hole on Friday.

You can opt out of Earthlink's typo redirection by using these nameservers:
207.69.188.171 (west coast)

207.69.188.172 (east coast)
http://kb.earthlink.net/case.asp?article=187117