Gaia gets ads from KNOWN -malware distributors-

[Slick Southpaw]

Flying Dicks

Lullabye Princess

My computer has been getting all kinds of tracking cookies and such. I recently updated my anti-viruis software. It says this site is safe but now I feel I should scan just in case.
I haven't been re-directed yet though.

Gaia itself is safe, its just the ads hosted through it are not. I use adblock plus, spybot search and destroy's immunization, and trend micro pc cillin internet security 14 and I have not had redirections since I got those things, but lots of people do have problems and you shouldnt need to download tons of third party apps just to be safe on a site that claims to care about your security.

IMO if they want you to pay them for ANYTHING they should be a wholly secure site. I've been to free porn sites with less ad troubles than Gaia, which is horrible.

oooh is spybot a FF add-on?

gonk My anti-virus software goes absolutely nuts on gaia. After installing NoScript on FF3, I found serious relief from redirects.
Can't say the same thing when I go on GoogleChrome to play zOMG. gonk Gaia, my laptop is shitty; it's dying a slow slow death, please don't kill it. *flails*

[Flying Dicks]

loukhos

Flying Dicks

Yeah I linked the Google diagnostic page in the first post I think.
Indeed, I would assume the reports started when they changed ad servers, which was a couple years ago, but until now, reports of viruses, redirects, and pop ups were dismissed as a user issue due to a dev posting saying people wouldn't get those ads if they weren't on those types of sites to begin with, and people got scared to speak up I guess. Even now we're still plagued with people who insist it is only the users' fault.

- - >

Ah, sorry. :'D

Anyways, that .. that doesn't really strike me as a professional way to deal with something like this, but that's just me. And now that we're in the know.. It's not the user's fault. It's a problem with the ad companies that Gaia has chosen and they should be the bigger guy and just own up to it.

I agree with your last post too. (Except the porn sites.. Haven't been there in awhile. xP)

­< - -

It's ok n.n
I edited it in, so you might not have seen it.

@Frenchie (lol)
Yeah I know. I checked it out of curiosity, I never figured they'd actually be rated dangerous- It takes quite a bit to get that bad of a rating. I block them too but I know as soon as I turn off any of those defense methods I get virus alerts and intrusion attempts, etc. I did get a virus from gaia a few weeks ago, but it was detected and stopped before it did any damage.

[Flying Dicks]

Slick Southpaw

Flying Dicks

Lullabye Princess

My computer has been getting all kinds of tracking cookies and such. I recently updated my anti-viruis software. It says this site is safe but now I feel I should scan just in case.
I haven't been re-directed yet though.

Gaia itself is safe, its just the ads hosted through it are not. I use adblock plus, spybot search and destroy's immunization, and trend micro pc cillin internet security 14 and I have not had redirections since I got those things, but lots of people do have problems and you shouldnt need to download tons of third party apps just to be safe on a site that claims to care about your security.

IMO if they want you to pay them for ANYTHING they should be a wholly secure site. I've been to free porn sites with less ad troubles than Gaia, which is horrible.

oooh is spybot a FF add-on?

gonk My anti-virus software goes absolutely nuts on gaia. After installing NoScript on FF3, I found serious relief from redirects.
Can't say the same thing when I go on GoogleChrome to play zOMG. gonk Gaia, my laptop is shitty; it's dying a slow slow death, please don't kill it. *flails*

Spybot Search and Destroy is a free anti-spyware utility that has an immunization feature, that allows you to block firefox and IE exploits from inside the system itself, as well as some windows exploits. It's very nice to have on your system, even if you are lazy and you forget to run it sometimes. (like me, not trying to call names xD I'm just lazy sometimes)

[-Atomic Cherry Fission-]

.NK.

I'm on IE right now, but even when I had FF with AdBlock, I still got redirects and I think I got popups too. Plus Adblock is causing people to be unable to view their My Gaia page.

Yeah, I found that out a few weeks ago when it wouldn't load. I had to do some digging to find something to fix it. Either way, I haven't had a pop-up or redirection in months. o.O; I guess I'm really, REALLY lucky, then. Still doesn't mean I won't block all of that stuff, though. Just to be safe.

@Flying Dicks (Now THAT is lulzy. x3) It's kind of sad that all this stuff happened to Gaia. It's a fantastic site, and it really doesn't deserve to get any lower ratings or whatever from something so simple as ad servers. I mean, it can be easily fixed, right? I'm no technician, but it seems easily fixable.

[[ .NK. ]]

Deh Insulting Frenchie

.NK.

I'm on IE right now, but even when I had FF with AdBlock, I still got redirects and I think I got popups too. Plus Adblock is causing people to be unable to view their My Gaia page.

Yeah, I found that out a few weeks ago when it wouldn't load. I had to do some digging to find something to fix it. Either way, I haven't had a pop-up or redirection in months. o.O; I guess I'm really, REALLY lucky, then. Still doesn't mean I won't block all of that stuff, though. Just to be safe.

It seems like the redirects are calmer than they used to be, but it's good that you're not getting any.

I got redirected to black people meet a few days ago. I actually found it hilarious even though it's annoying.

[Flying Dicks]

Deh Insulting Frenchie

@Flying Dicks (Now THAT is lulzy. x3) It's kind of sad that all this stuff happened to Gaia. It's a fantastic site, and it really doesn't deserve to get any lower ratings or whatever from something so simple as ad servers. I mean, it can be easily fixed, right? I'm no technician, but it seems easily fixable.

Yeah, I agree. Gaia seems to be slipping a bit. But hey, I'm not trying to be mean I'm just concerned, y'know? I guess I might come off as a bit mean, but I don't mean to. It'd help Gaia as well as the users to fix the ad situation though- And the devs have been asking for as much help as we can give, so surely to narrow it down to a few ad servers would help.

[-Atomic Cherry Fission-]

.NK.

It seems like the redirects are calmer than they used to be, but it's good that you're not getting any.

I got redirected to black people meet a few days ago. I actually found it hilarious even though it's annoying.

Oh, the one that says something like "MEET BLACK/ASIAN/HISPANIC PEOPLE TODAY!" Except, it's either one or the other? Those things are hilarious. A friend of mine showed me that ad at her house and we laughed about it for a while.
I'll admit, some of the ads can be funny, like 'run over the fat guy and win a ps3!', but after a while, they get kind of annoying.

Flying Dicks

Yeah, I agree. Gaia seems to be slipping a bit. But hey, I'm not trying to be mean I'm just concerned, y'know? I guess I might come off as a bit mean, but I don't mean to. It'd help Gaia as well as the users to fix the ad situation though- And the devs have been asking for as much help as we can give, so surely to narrow it down to a few ad servers would help.

I don't blame you for being concerned about this. Trust me, I am, too. And if there's any way we can help them find out what specific servers are causing the damage, I'm sure they'll be able to figure out what to do from there. I guess there's only so much we can do. Is there a Dev that you could report all of the sites to, or do they just pick that up from reading threads? o.O;

[loukhos]

Flying Dicks

Yeah, I agree. Gaia seems to be slipping a bit. But hey, I'm not trying to be mean I'm just concerned, y'know? I guess I might come off as a bit mean, but I don't mean to. It'd help Gaia as well as the users to fix the ad situation though- And the devs have been asking for as much help as we can give, so surely to narrow it down to a few ad servers would help.

- - >

I'm sure it would help a whole lot too. <3 The process for reporting the individual ads is kind of long and hard for normal users. If they take down the problem ad servers, that should kind of cut the trouble off at the roots. (Though, I am pretty much just repeating what's been said. xD; )

n.n Nah, I just saw the original version, I think.

­< - -

[Flying Dicks]

Deh Insulting Frenchie

Flying Dicks

Yeah, I agree. Gaia seems to be slipping a bit. But hey, I'm not trying to be mean I'm just concerned, y'know? I guess I might come off as a bit mean, but I don't mean to. It'd help Gaia as well as the users to fix the ad situation though- And the devs have been asking for as much help as we can give, so surely to narrow it down to a few ad servers would help.

I don't blame you for being concerned about this. Trust me, I am, too. And if there's any way we can help them find out what specific servers are causing the damage, I'm sure they'll be able to figure out what to do from there. I guess there's only so much we can do. Is there a Dev that you could report all of the sites to, or do they just pick that up from reading threads? o.O;

Hmm, well devs get a lot of PMs, so I'm not sure how much good PMing them would do but Panagrammic is usually around SF so hopefully he will see this <3
I think that this should help a bit since Web of trust is pretty reputable and a lot of the cookies I got when I did get them were from those sites or ones that seemed related. Gaia says they dont get the problems much in-house but I think they use macs?

In any case, some users actively talk to the devs so maybe they will see and alert them to it? xD I think if a dev sees a pm from someone named Flying Dicks they might.. yeah.. not open it.. xDD

[Bunai]

Even without FF and Adblock, I use my moms laptop, who has EI, and I never got a virus or a redirect while on Gaia.

A LOT of the websites are trying to track down rouge ads. The ones about Redirects - has been around for quite a while, and no one can seem to get the coding, since it's embedded somewhere. Is it deliberately by the forum people are using? No.

Something is basically hijacking the ads, and even Administrators are having a hard time trying to find the exact source.


I hope they do keep a watchful eye on what ads are updated to the site. Especially the ones that have been known to cause problems.

[Flying Dicks]

legal

[Viets Wifey]

Ya know it's weird, I wasn't having too many problems until a few days ago. Then yesterday while I was surfing gaia firefox started going wonky and the tab up top mentioned blocking 3 pop-ups, I look away for a moment because I was doing something else and when I look back my gaia page has become some sort of medical pill selling s**t site x.x

[Cucco]

ah. So this is why I keep getting redirected? gonk I've had this computer blocking scripts that have from this site, probably from those ads...
I get redirected to 'single hotties' crap too...
IE 7... it gets past the 'phishing filter' easily.
EDIT: plus some of my friends claimed to be getting viruses from my quest thread alone, but there's no ads on that page, so is that possible?

[Flying Dicks]

Cucco

ah. So this is why I keep getting redirected? gonk I've had this computer blocking scripts that have from this site, probably from those ads...
I get redirected to 'single hotties' crap too...
IE 7... it gets past the 'phishing filter' easily.
EDIT: plus some of my friends claimed to be getting viruses from my quest thread alone, but there's no ads on that page, so is that possible?

It's possible because the ad scripts and cookies etc still load. I also think there are ads in some pages of the site, and I've heard people getting redirected while reading a thread or posting so it is, unfortunately, possible.

[Fierce Hot Mess v2]

Has it ever occured to you that they may be under contract? They may not, but then again it's very likely.

I doubt the ad companies would pay Gaia on a day-to-day basis.