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Google Ad Disguising Itself as www.gimp.org

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Re: Google Ad Disguising Itself as www.gimp.org

#211
post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just to avoid no confusion, the issue here is that the URL displayed in the ad (and also when hovering over it) has a different domain from the page the user lands on when they actually click the ad. It's not about whether the advertiser owns the domain.

Assuming you meant "just to avoid any confusion" :)

[deleted]

Re: Google Ad Disguising Itself as www.gimp.org

#212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wasn't even talking about paid links specifically. It's advertising in general that's the problem. Call me a child all you want, I don't care. The simple fact remains that they have an inherent conflict of interest. It's not an absurd argument at all. People who want to sell you something have every incentive to distort the truth and only fools believe them.

Arguing that advertising in general is bad is even more of a nonsense statement.

[deleted]

Re: Google Ad Disguising Itself as www.gimp.org

#213
post #64

In this particular case, I suspect a trademark complaint against Google would make sense. Google misrepresented the ad as the product of the Gimp project, and were paid as a result. They usually use an "obeying the law would not scale" type argument in court, but that would clearly be bullshit in this case. They have a business relationship with the ad buyer, and should have verified their affiliation with gimp.org.…

GIMP is not a registered trademark anywhere in the world. Unfortunately. Which made it possible for a number of scammers to be really bold (and be punished in the end, on one of the occasions).

Re: Google Ad Disguising Itself as www.gimp.org

#214
post #197
post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having the actual url be completely different from the displayed url simply shouldn't be possible. Allowing that invites scams like these. At the very least, they need to be the same domain.

Redditor RawPacket writes[1] that it's probably an IDN homograph attack[2]: the g, i, m, or p are replaced with characters from a different character set. Looks right, but the domain is registered with a different character. Example: * gіmp.com is fake. * gimp.com is real. They look the same, don't they? But if you click on the fake gіmp.com, your browser will take you to the domain xn--gmp-jhd.com as it is using the…

For a moment I was thinking "But then the second screenshot would read "xn--gmp-jhd.com", not "gilimp.org" -- but that would be easily hidden by making the former immediately redirect to the latter.

(Mostly I mention this because someone else might be thinking at as well.)

Re: Google Ad Disguising Itself as www.gimp.org

#215
post #197
post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having the actual url be completely different from the displayed url simply shouldn't be possible. Allowing that invites scams like these. At the very least, they need to be the same domain.

Redditor RawPacket writes[1] that it's probably an IDN homograph attack[2]: the g, i, m, or p are replaced with characters from a different character set. Looks right, but the domain is registered with a different character. Example: * gіmp.com is fake. * gimp.com is real. They look the same, don't they? But if you click on the fake gіmp.com, your browser will take you to the domain xn--gmp-jhd.com as it is using the…

Are different character sets allowed in urls? Because that too sounds like a massive mistake inviting these sort of scams. Sorry, but stick to ascii.

Re: Google Ad Disguising Itself as www.gimp.org

#216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes! This is crazy to me. How can this not be a thing that has already been discovered and instantly fixed?

Many ad buyers are not-so-sophisticated... They might work for BigCo, but rather than have the ad point to bigco.com/product they instead have the ad point to tinyurl/bitly so they can track how many people click the ad and repoint it to another URL easily. There is a whole industry of these redirection services that gather stats, direct users different directions based on mobile/desktop or country. It isn't rare to…

No, ad networks don't have to allow any of that. And they shouldn't. Ad buyers should either not track, or do it properly. Demanding massive security holes because you can't be bothered to learn the right way to do it is unreasonable.

Re: Google Ad Disguising Itself as www.gimp.org

#218
post #215
post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Redditor RawPacket writes[1] that it's probably an IDN homograph attack[2]: the g, i, m, or p are replaced with characters from a different character set. Looks right, but the domain is registered with a different character. Example: * gіmp.com is fake. * gimp.com is real. They look the same, don't they? But if you click on the fake gіmp.com, your browser will take you to the domain xn--gmp-jhd.com as it is using the…

Are different character sets allowed in urls? Because that too sounds like a massive mistake inviting these sort of scams. Sorry, but stick to ascii.

Modern browsers won't show those characters in the address bar, exactly to avoid this issue. Which is maybe why the ad points to gilimp.org instead of the gimp.org lookalike.

Re: Google Ad Disguising Itself as www.gimp.org

#219
post #197
post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having the actual url be completely different from the displayed url simply shouldn't be possible. Allowing that invites scams like these. At the very least, they need to be the same domain.

Redditor RawPacket writes[1] that it's probably an IDN homograph attack[2]: the g, i, m, or p are replaced with characters from a different character set. Looks right, but the domain is registered with a different character. Example: * gіmp.com is fake. * gimp.com is real. They look the same, don't they? But if you click on the fake gіmp.com, your browser will take you to the domain xn--gmp-jhd.com as it is using the…

That's a good theory, but I don't think it's what happened here. The ads are gone for me now so I can't verify, but when I did get the ad I checked the network monitor and I'm pretty sure there were no redirects via lookalike domains. Also, I'm pretty sure I copy and pasted the display URL and it was plain ASCII.

Re: Google Ad Disguising Itself as www.gimp.org

#220
post #74
post #64

In this particular case, I suspect a trademark complaint against Google would make sense. Google misrepresented the ad as the product of the Gimp project, and were paid as a result. They usually use an "obeying the law would not scale" type argument in court, but that would clearly be bullshit in this case. They have a business relationship with the ad buyer, and should have verified their affiliation with gimp.org.…

> obeying the law would not scale I don't know why, but that sentence terrifies me. It's like the silicon valley version of a dystopia.

We are already living in a dystopia.
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