Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

To VM (admittedly to the customer service peoples, but I shall be writing to others when I get back from handing my dissertation in later)

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Some interesting points about the Charles Stanley document over on Badphorm

http://www.badphorm.co.uk/e107_plugi...pic.php?4672.0

Particularly the need to be careful about quoting from and linking to an intended 'subscription only' document. We may need to be careful about what we do and say about this.

Any legally minded bods might care to comment further.

(I've noticed Badphorm have removed links to the document itself and only reference the iii site where a link can be found.)

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

a spokesman for Sky, the UK's fastest growing broadband network with about 1.2 million lines, said: "Sky is interested in exploring the potential for targeted online advertising and is talking with a number of companies operating in this area.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/02...d_isp_targets/

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

From the report :
Perhaps someone at Stanley can see the irony here. I saw nothing that prevents access straight from either a direct link or from Google.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Ha thats funny 3X2. yup no problem linking to or taking that article then.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

But is the link we have to the original document location or to an unauthorised copy?

Mods may have a view?

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

The file is hosted on the capmarkets.com site. It is not in a restricted directory and is directly available to the general public without the need to register or authenticate.

It will also more than likely end up in google's cache.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Interesting point - www.capmarkets.com redirects to http://www.bigdough.com/ir/index.cfm and "company info" redirects to http://www.ipreo.com/pages/history.asp.

You may very well be right. That's the problem with the net though isn't it. If Phorm were operating now then they would be reading the document too and advertising "stock brokers" to me. Further Phorm would be the only ones making money out the whole (potential) mess.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

The link to the capsmarket site for the document has an ID number in the url -so it may represent a link someone got after logging in.
I've changed my BT post to simply link to the iii.co.uk forum post that contains the Charles Stanley note url
http://www.iii.co.uk/investment/deta...ail&id=4006735

I suggest this forum does the same.

The capsmarket.com url on its own redirects to http://www.bigdough.com/ir/index.cfm

One question that comes to mind - if I had been logged into Webwise when I accessed that document, presumably its contents would have been profiled? And if it is actually a protected docuement, available theoretically only to logged in customers of the site, the owners wouldn't have given consent for it to be profiled?

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I think so. Of course Phorm would just slate anyone who suggested that and accuse them of trying to prevent technology advancing...

Anyone seen PhormUKPRteam today? I'm wondering what their response to my challenge is. Any decent, open, honest, transparent organisation which is keen to honestly discuss the issues put to it here and elsewhere would be happy to respond fully, honestly and without spin.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

PC-Pro have this article online and one coming up in the printed magazine on the 15th May.

http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/191901/h...-on-phorm.html

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I didn't see PhormUKPRteam log on to here at all yesterday or so far today. I am wondering if Kent has fired them all and has decided the best phorm of PR he can push is his own personal agenda laden with insults and personal attacks.

Alexander Hanff

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Perhaps reading just as guests to stop us asking them questions mind I would like them to know I am now officially looking after my mothers interests as a BT shareholder at future AGMs. :D

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

OK I just got off the phone with Simon Davies. It was a brief call as he was about to start a radio interview, but he has promised to call me back this afternoon. He did state he has just returned from Italy (which verifies my comments earlier in the week that it may have been an extended trip).

I phoned him to find out if he had any more information on the official video from the PIA meeting, so hopefully I will have more information on the video this afternoon.

Alexander Hanff

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

If he has fired them wouldn't someone like Dhaljit at Under Strict Embargo mention it in his blog? Haven't seen anything mentioned in PR Week or anything like that...

Forgot to get some English Breakfast Tea while out earlier. Ah well, back later

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Was the interview about Phorm? Any idea which station?

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I have no idea and it would have been rude to ask.

Alexander Hanff

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Definitely too well brought up to associate with phormites....;)

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

its to late for morning tea now Capt, your going to have to make do with afternoon tea and crumpets :angel:

http://www.squidoo.com/crumpets_club
http://sippingtea.com/etiquette.html
http://search.virginmedia.com/result...tryUK&x=39&y=9

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I find that English Breakfast Tea really hits the spot and helps me to relax.

There's some Harrods EB and Ceylon tea in my cupboard but I use those for special occasions, favourite visitors and the like.

And as for crumpet... oh, sorry, I didn't see the extra "s" there :) But now you've got me thinking about food... :)

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

If anyone is thinking of jumping ship to a LLU ADSL provider, BT appear to be doing a special offer on new connections.

See http://www.serviceview.bt.com/list/p...o/SNL21-08.pdf

It appears to be an 18 month subscription though.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

The Phorm hardware is on the outbound request, not the inbound response, though I guess both will be going through the same switches.
Unless the site is signed up to OIX it will not suddenly be getting new OIX adverts. If it is subscribed to OIX then the adverts sent back from the OIX server will be targeted, not blanket.
This bit of your post is a little misleading, though to caveat this, it has been discussed that Phorm hardware does have the ability to modify response pages.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Jump ship to BT?

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Not strictly true I am afraid. The Phorm system copies the entire web page to RAM for profiling, so they must be involved in the inbound response otherwise they would not be able to do that.

Alexander Hanff

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Yep - your're right - just finished the morning coffee. I guess what I was trying to say was that while both are copied to the profiler only the outbound request is currently messed around with and 307 redirected to put the cookies on the requesting machine. The inbound response, while copied to the profiler is currently sent to the user unaltered. The OP was indicating that the Phorm applications could or would be replacing advertisments on the site they were viewing with Phorm/OIX adverts, this is not the case (as the technology currently stands).

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

No, to a LLU provider e.g. Aquiss or BE. You still need a BT line, or am I mistaken?

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Yeah I agree with you there. However, historically (during the BT trials) it was used to do exactly that (insert javascripted ads into the response), so I think people can be forgiven for being concerned that it is likely to happen in the future through mission creep.

Alexander Hanff

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

There are some key details in the technical review of the current operation that I think are worth highlighting .

- Only port 80 is profiled. So I don't see why people should be worried about online banking and https traffic.

- The redirection between servers must be bad for performance, and even if people don't care much about ads they don't click on, they will care about anything that impacts performance.


Maybe in a prophylactic section.

- Only well known browsers are profiled. So it would be good advice to get the User Agent extension for FF or to use Opera.
- The effect of blocking cookies
- The dephormation FF addin.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

If Phorm somehow manage to get Webwise approved by the courts and accepted by even 20% of it's intended victims, then I'd confidently expect News International to make a bid to buy the company rather than simply signup as a client.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Respectfully: How do you know this is all that they do? - This is what they say they do (now), but what else is going on? Unless you can get hands-on and disassemble their code (not exactly easy!), we have only their word for it. And we do know that they are a bunch of lying, spyware-purveying, Russian *******s. If they said "Here, download this neat little root kit, it will keep you safe and make you money" would you do it? What is the difference?

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Agreed.
Hope Kent hasn't accepted any investment from, erm, the shadier side of Moscow's business community!

Is that blood that I can smell?
:shocked:

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

If they managed to break https (SLL) then they would be bl0ody good programmers/mathamatitions. I really dont think we have to worry about the https being profiled as its all but impossible to do - the only way to do it usually is by back door attacks, not man in the middle - so I really dont think we need to wory about our banking transactions.

Unless your bank doesnt use https - but if this were the case - I would dump that bank ASAP!

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I've been meaning to post some thoughts on the question of performance.

Given the mythical white lists, black lists, user agent filters, opt in/out/shake it all about cookies...

The processing of every request, in real time is going to be a big overhead isn't it?

For each request Phorm must;

- Check for cookies, and perform redirects if necessary to set cookies*
- Check the URL against a black list of 25 (up to 60,000+) private sites**
- Check the user agent against a list of target user-agents***
- Check the request for http auth params to avoid protected content****
- Filter the page and URL for names/addresses/identifiers/sensitive words****

* caveat, opted out users must use different infrastructure
** caveat, this will never be complete no matter how long the list
*** caveat, this will still result in non-browser apps being profiled
**** caveat, inadequate because many unencrypted yet private txns are not authenticated
***** caveat, this will never ever work ... it will capture names & identifiers of all kinds

And that's for every request, before you even start profiling the content.

The overhead on an http request will be immense.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

So maybe getting as many things added to the black list *is* a good idea - sorry Alexander.

Can you imagine the performance hit if hit had to search 1million website for every session.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

No but they could easily reroute your web page to a rogue site as with their previous phishing expeditions. If you think that little padlock means you are secure dream on....

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

BUT then your certificate would not match the site name - and a great big warning would come up! If you think Thawte or any other root certificate supplier would give phorm a certificate for EVERY https site in the world - well we are into massive consiracy theorys there.

Lets keep the discussion on to things that can realisticly happen.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Polonium I think ...

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

BT have said that if someone sets their browser e.t.c. to block webwise during the trial, then they won't be able to access the internet for the duration of the trial.

If thats the case then, it's irrelevant whether you opt in or out, your data will still be redirected to webwise servers, and will be dependant on the functioning of those servers.

So if Phorm's equipment fails, it could in theory leave hundreds of thousands of people without the ability to surf the web regardless of whether or not they opted in or out.

This means that if someone can't access the web, they won't know whether the liability rests with BT or with Phorm.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Why do I think that the 'blacklist' is just more vapourware? There may be a list that you can add your site to, but how would you know if you were still 'accidentally' being profiled? And what would your remedy be (get in the queue after 108,000 other BT offences).

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Probably the longest task but sub-second per request and requests will be performed in a multi-threaded app with multiple requests being processed in parallel.


60000 * 100 chars = 600k of memory so in memory caching of this and the lookup will take nanoseconds

Again, in-memory caching and nanosecond lookups

Extracting and checking a few parameters from a HTTP request object... milliseconds

This depends on their software but would (I hope) be layed off onto the profiler box which would be out of band and would not affect the transaction.

So all in all, the traffic shouldn't be affected noticibly.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

If they are contracted to BT, then the fault lies with BT.

Pure and simple, every time.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I think it is fairer to say that BT have been fairly vague about that particular issue but it is definitely one way of interpreting the grammatically confusing answer they gave. If I ever hear that the trials have started I will certainly be blocking via HOSTS all the relevant oix, phorm and webwise domains I have listed, and also blocking the cookies (to model a cookie free situation) to see what happens to my browsing. If that breaks my browsing then I think it will probably break BT also.

But they have been quite good at grammatically confusing written answers, and even in broadcasts, their spokespeople seem to manage oral stumbles that likewise leave you not QUITE sure what they meant - with the same hesitations/fluffed words at exactly the same point of the same answer on different news bulletins during different interviews.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Your initial http request would not get near your bank. The layer 7 device would divert it to the standard phishing front page, which would look to you like your banks login and shared secrets pages. Now they have your details. Perhaps you should re-read Richard Clayton's tech description.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Yes they will:

They have a contract with BT.

The Phorm supplied equipment will reside on BT's site(s) and there's a funny arrangement whereby it's owned by BT (but BT have limited access to the equipment).

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Sounds like BT had one of the blonde days best way is to have two lines of fight the one to makes ure it doesn't happen and backup for if it does..

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

As BT put my 2 sites on their "do not profile" blacklist I will be very interested to see if they DO get profiled. I may even sign up to Webwise briefly with one of my BTY sub-accounts and visit the site to see what the logs look like. I have to agree - I can't see all that on-the-fly checking working myself, but once the system goes live, if it ever does, I'll be hunting the webmaster sites for ways of detecting the visits. If they are requesting robots.txt then presumably they have to do that from somewhere and it should be fairly easy to visit a site at a set time by arrangement and then check for the robots.txt request by Phorm machinery.

Dephormation.org has various webmaster tools available but I haven't examined them yet - I will if Webwise actually goes live. The one I would most like is the Webwise detector, followed by a redirection of the Webwise-using browser by the affected site, to a Phorm/Webwise information page which encourages people to opt out of Webwise, complain to their ISP and offers links to all the various anti-Webwise sites available. Now that is what I call targeted advertising!

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I'd suggested we should do this in the past, but I've reflected on what Alexander said about it and I now think this is a very bad idea. If an official blacklist exists, it renders any RIPA notice placed on the front of a website totally ineffective - Phorm would have the defence that they should have requested that their site was added to the black list.

What we should be doing is encouraging as many website owners as possible to place a notice on their site prohibiting interception. If we all do it in our own words to make it difficult for Phorm to automatically detect the notice - so much the better. If the notice is there they have to obey it.

What should be happening is that Phorm specify either an entry in robots.txt, or a similar file just for this purpose, which permits Phorm and any similar organisations to intercept the traffic for profiling providing the visitor to the website has also given their informed consent. That is it should be an opt in for websites as well as the Phormed ISPs users.

I'm having a PM conversation with Pete @ dephormation about something that would complement this approach very nicely - I hope he'll have something to announce soon.

---------- Post added at 17:24 ---------- Previous post was at 17:22 ----------

Funny you should say that! (see the post above) :rolleyes:

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

What if the Russian programmers incorporate a Transparent SSL proxy into the Phorm DPI and web faking computers. If the following URL is to be believed this technology already exists:- :shocked:

http://www.intelcommsalliance.com/ks...04daf53086f015

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

We've yet to clarify even that - more (deliberate?) BT vagueness - the current BT Webwise site where ALL the info on Webwise is kept, and where the various cookies appeared from briefly (by mistake of course) is NOT on bt.com but on a different redirecting page at webwise.bt.com which is hosted by FASTHOSTS (and has been down recently when FASTHOSTS went down - its the budget end of the hosting market). At the moment it sets a "session" cookie which does disappear at the end of the session. A few weeks ago it was doing less predictable cookie stuff for which BT "apologised".

Name: PHPSESSID
Content: 6eb1b36ac1a808a682d5c741990b14aa
Host: www.webwise.bt.com
Path: /
Send For: Any type of connection
Expires: at end of session

Do the lookups and see - webwise.bt.com WHOIS lookup appears kosher, but the reverse IP lookups on the resultant IP's
88.208.250.85
88.208.248.102
88.208.250.66
show the FASTHOSTS details.

They seem to have got rid of the IP address that resolved back to Phorm, within the last week. So the pressure is getting to them!

They do pretend it's on bt.com in some of their links which put http://bt.com/webwise/ in your browser - but after a lengthy pause and a lot of status bar activity, it ends up at http://www.webwise.bt.com/webwise/index.php and that doesn't resolve to a BT host.

I've been asking BT to put their Webwise FAQ on pages hosted on their own domain and they said to me they would do it (a week ago) but they haven't done it yet - at least a site search doesn't find it except on the webwise.bt.com pages. So anyone with Webwise urls blocked can't read the BT Webwise FAQ. Bit much when your ISP puts really vital information on pages hosted outside the internal IP range it is officially responsible for.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Not sure if your first paragraph is correct.

The BT produced schematic for how the trial will work, shows that if there is an opt-out cookie present or if you block Webwise.net, then you data goes nowhere near the profiler. See: http://webwise.bt.com/webwise/customer_choice.html

However, if you op-in to the trial and then block Webwise.net, then my understanding is that your browsing could well grind to a halt.

John

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Here is the reply I got on 18th April from a BT manager.
Beginning of quote -
11) What will happen to the "browsing experience" of a BT customer who adds all the various oix/phorm/webwise domains to his/her HOSTS file, once Webwise/Phorm is in place? Will that "break" my browsing experience?

Answer from manager - If a customer who is invited to participate in the trial adds www.webwise.net to their local HOSTS file with the resolved address of 127.0.0.1, they will not be able to browse the Internet on HTTP port 80 on that PC for the period of the trial. This is because access to www.webwise.net is required in order to process the consent status of the user during the trial. Instead, and as per the advice on the www.bt.com/webwise site, the recommended approach for excluding a PC from the Webwise service if the user regularly deletes cookies is to add www.webwise.net to the browser's blocked cookie list. As previously stated, in parallel with the forthcoming trial, we are developing a solution which will manage the choice of users without the use of cookies. We believe this approach is reasonable and is supported by the advice we have received. - end of quote

As you can see the answer is ambiguous, and only refers to the trial. It suggests that the trial will require a cookie based opt-out but leaves open the possibility of a non cookie based opt-out for the future.

As you can see the answer avoids dealing with the situation of a customer who is NOT in the trial, but has no cookie, and who has the webwise.net domain blocked in HOSTS. I'm sure this vagueness is deliberate. If the trial goes ahead, we'll find out very easily.It could be argued from this manager's answer that even opting out (or ignoring) the trial altogether, will require a cookie and access to www.webwise.net.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

BT (or any ISPs who sign up to Phorm) will have no access to the Phorm equipment. This has been mentioned a few times in this thread (and the IT pros who contribute are as shocked as me they would allow this) and it is confirmed by Nicholas Bohm's legal analysis.

Phorm's approach is "Trust us, we're the good guys even though we won't let you anywhere near our kit".

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Nope not quite correct. If you are in one of the exchanges being used for the trial irrespective of whether or not you opt-in, if you block the webwise domains in your hosts file by redirecting them to localhost (127.0.0.1) then you will not be able to browse the web.

The reason for this is all traffic for the entire exchange will be passed through the Layer 7 technology during the trial and then redirected as described by Dr Richard Clayton to a "special machine" masquerading as the web site you want to access. This is the main consequence of the cookie system they are currently using.

If you note the correspondence R Jones had with BT (above) you can see it states any user who is "invited" to the trials, not any user who "accepts" an invite. When you read that statement and understand the technical analysis by Richard it is clear that this will include everyone in the exchange as it specifically needs to go to the webwise domain to get the opt-out cookie. If you redirect to localhost that cookie will never be set and you will be stuck in a loop. The loop that Kent stated could only ever effect a maximum of 1% of customers...

Alexander Hanff

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I made bold the part I wished to check up on it should be impossible to do the whole exchange since there will be some on the exchange that are not BT BB customers so not part of their network to trial this on...

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Sorry let me clarify, all BT retail customers at the exchange. Of course it could be that the BT statement sent to R Jones was inaccurate but if it is true than I believe my analysis is correct.

Alexander Hanff

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Cheers Alexander or we would have been starting more legal proceedings for intercepting other ISPs customers.. :D

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

And what makes you think that BT would not do this or has not already?

LOL - Only joshing :dunce::dunce::dunce:

(I imagine that would be a step too far and technically hard to do)

Hank

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

RE: Secure banking.

Most users online that i know of, myself included have a list of maybe half a dozen passwords/datasets that are frequently used, for instance some people use the same passwords for email (secure and unsecure webbased), forums and banking.

Its not outside the realm of possibility to get a users profile and figure out his half dozen passwords and the URL of his bank, then brute force the account with a very small list (generaly 3 attempts before the account is locked and you need to call up your bank) that would result in a 50% chance of gaining access to someones account.

This without even discusing the possibilities of an external organisation gaining control of the packet filtering equipment and monitoring the streams from users at a given exchange to their own ends, then redirecting traffic to a spoofed DNS that again redirects people to a frudulent mirror of your banks site.

You honestly think that serious criminal and terrorist organisations have no interest in an almost unlimited free source of additional income to pay for whatever will forward their agendas? even if such a move involved actual physical access to the equipment its a striaght forward matter to hand an openreach worker a nice fat brown envelope to look the other way for 30 mins whilst you peruse the premises.

Think about this:
I (Being a criminal mastermind genius) start sniffing on customers data and begin compiling a list for each customers passwords over unsecured connections.
I also generate a list for each customers online banking urls (not the actual secure stuff just the site URL)
I also spend a couple of hundred opening bank accounts to the sites found to be most frequently used, i do this merely to gain access to those bank sites and set up my own fake servers, you have to speculate to accumulate ;)

Now after mirroring my own bogus servers i start redirecting traffic to them using phorms equipment to route everything through my own shady DNS servers, i do this only to harvest customer passwords and once i have these passwords i display an error stating the website is currently down for "Maintainance" followed by an appology and a request to "please allow up to 24hrs while we fix our errors." (Masterminds are not all like Blofeld we can be nice too)

After 12~18hrs i stop redirecting traffic, and do this same redirection every few weeks for the next 6 months farming as much as i can.
After this 6 months i would purchase my flights to a non extradition country with a damned good telecommunications network (Russia and China spring to mind as fun destinations)
i then run my script to systematicaly log in to and transfer money out of the millions of valid accounts now at my disposal, starting with all business accounts (netting me the most cash) right down through to individal personal accounts.
Funneling all this cash into a long list of seperate accounts abroad (that i would have been spending the 6 month profiling time setting up) this is to avoid suspicion of every british resident dumping money into a single tracable account and raising a red flag.
Then i would start phase 2 to swap the money around these accounts and bounce it around a little before trickling into a nice large private account, the trick is to keep it moving around and confuse anoyone looking to trace it to a single point, after nine hours of reviewing logs anyone will go squeg eyed and begin to make errors.
After touching down in Russia i would then extract as much cash as i could by hand and place it onto a few banks over there before transfering it around further, using some to get myself a nice "black market" new identity. To move around to another country where i would hapily reside for the rest of my life knee deep in banknotes.
Once set up i would forward Kent an email enquiring as to the point of targeting adverts to anyone online in the UK when they no longer had any money to be interested in any of them.

Thereby pulling off the biggest bank heist in history and netting myself a nice little sum to start a new life of absurd and unending pleasures beyond anyones wildest dreams.
Of course i would totaly cripple the UK economy as residents and businessmen woke the next day to have their cards eaten by the machines.
But frankly to hell with you guys, i can afford a slew of lawyers to fend you off :)

All this with a few months of setup, without having to resort to violence or raising my voice and not placing a single hostage or even myself at any risk.

The best of it is that since the police and home office are entirely reluctant to investigate what happens online it could take months of red tape before a single suspect is generated let alone people pointing the finger at me :D

It would however make an awesome screenplay (and this has the added benifit of not having an angry nation track me down like the dog that i am.)

Ok so maybe im scaremongeing and just a touch sarcastic and upon rereading it, I seem to descend entirely into paranoid drivel and sheer tinfoil hattery.
But the simple fact is that monitoring SSL and https isnt nessisary to gain some seriously sensitive information on a person that could be used to his or her detriment.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Well, on a day when German TV bought 'Allo 'Allo, I suppose anything is possible!:)

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

More answers from a BT manager. As the person in question is now going on holiday, no more answers for a while! (unless I can provoke someone else or head back upstairs to the CEO's penthouse!)

The questions are somewhat edited, but I've left their version of the question for clarity. These are official management level BT responses.

The good thing is that having got someone's attention, I have been given answers and courteous replies for which I am grateful. The content of the replies may still be very very unsatisfactory, but I am getting responses. I'm grateful for small mercies.

(beginning of BT quote)
1. Website cookie forging by Webwise/Phorm remains murky and unexplained by Phorm - who gave anyone permission to forge a cookie purporting to come from one of my registered domains? I withhold consent for BT/Phorm to use the domain names of my sites within any cookie set by Webwise.

A: Webwise cookies are clearly associated with the Webwise service. Where a website uses cookies, we prefix the Webwise UID (unique ID, a random number) to a cookie coming from the website. It is clear in this cookie at what point the Webwise UID starts and the domain cookie stops (and vice versa). Where cookies are not used by a website, only the Webwise UID is placed into a new cookie which will be associated with the domain of the website being visited. In both cases, the Webwise UID element of the cookie is clearly labelled so as to be associated with the Webwise service.

2. In response to your question this week - whether or not you are liable to prosecution if you visit websites like Amazon etc....

A: Any user who has consented to taking the BT Webwise service will not make any unauthorised use of a website as a result of taking the Webwise service. BT has carefully considered the privacy and legal issues arising from the BT Webwise service and we are confident that operating the service does not lead to issues for our users in this regard.

3. In response to your question yesterday regarding the legality of Webwise/Phorm following the publication of the latest FIPR report and the forthcoming trial dates.....

BT and Phorm have sought extensive legal advice over the last two years and been in regular contact with both the ICO and Home Office. I am sure you have seen their recent statements also. We have also reviewed the FIPR report. BT is, of course, aware of the legal requirements regarding interception of communications under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000. We consider that the steps we are taking will meet the legal requirements of RIPA and also ensure that customers are able to take a fully informed decision as to whether to take the service (it will be optional and customers will have a clear choice). Furthermore we are confident that Webwise/our approach conforms with other relevant UK laws.

We will commence trialling BT Webwise shortly and have committed to providing at least 24 hours notice prior to commencing the trial. We will do this via the BT forums etc.. Rest assured it is not unusual for trial/launch dates to change..... (end BT quote)

I think that does not add anything much - it all basically reads to me like - "we know what we are doing and its legal so there!"

The cookie answer leaves me somewhat speechless. I hope this person never finds my credit card or cheque book in the street - they may feel they can write my signature on the cheques and use them in the few shops that still take such things. Maybe they would clone my credit card, stick a Webwise logo on it and use it to buy things! If they say that is legal, it must be!

I suppose its now time to examine cookies from a variety of organisations to see how obvious it is where they come from. I'll start with BT.

And the one good bit - I can now access Webwise FAQ without going to webwise.bt.com.

It is interesting to see BT being responsive - I've never ever experienced this level of responsiveness from senior management - usually its one emollient email promising the earth and then back to the normal business of ignoring us and leaving us to the mercy of the outsourced drones - they must be really really rattled.

(Recommence BT quote here)
Finally we have been working on the Webwise FAQ information on bt.com. It is a work in progress at the moment and there will be further changes to it between now and the trial but for the time being you can access the information via the URL http://www.productsandservices.bt.co...=CON-WEBWISE-I
End of BT quote

I recommend the experts here to browse the BT Webwise FAQ. It has some gems - for example

Q - Will this disrupt my service or make browsing slower?
A- No. BT Webwise is run from BT's networks, so it won't disrupt your service or make it slower.

Note that - not even 1% of people will be affected. Just a straight NO

I love it. If BT were the ministry of Transport...
Q - Will the three lanes of roadworks on the M25 and the closure and diversion between Junctions 23 and 27 during June, July and August, affect my commuting journey?
A- No, it won't disrupt your journey or make it slower.

Bye.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Completely ignored your question and your concerns. Altering an existing cookie from a domain without permission could be seen to infringe Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 as well as Computer Misuse Act 1990 and Fraud Act 2006. Creating a new cookie because a domain does not issues cookies, is almost definitely a violation of Fraud Act 2006 as explained by Dr Richard Clayton at the PIA public meeting.

Nicholas Bohm is currently looking into this issue after I raised my concerns with him on the subject of complicity. It would seem likely that if the system is illegal, knowingly opting into that system and then initiating an unauthorised interception by communicating with a web site who have denied consent, that the user would be complicit and guilty of incitement.

An outright lie. It has been confirmed by the Home Office and ICO that neither BT nor Phorm have communicated with them prior to January this year. Also, they have yet again left themselves wide open for liability with regards to the 2006/2007 trials in saying they believe the steps they "are taking" will be compatible with RIPA as opposed to saying the system is currently and always has been compatible with RIPA.

Basically, their entire reply is nothing but a charade.

Alexander Hanff

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

The senior managers at BT are, to all intents and purposes, smoking their own dope.

:dozey:

Hank

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I had a feeling you'd be underwhelmed. ;)

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Alexander and Robert

Thanks for your explanations regarding my post #4851, much appreciated.

John

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Excellent :D

But I think you've missed that Man In The Middle can and does know what encrypted data was transferred to your machine when you went to your bank's login page. That page is (if it's like my bank's) full of "we is teh secure" logos + the usual corporate graphic identity crap. That's a damn good start to cracking an SSL session key which is why people who know worry about MITM attacks. The best way to crack any kind of crypto is to have an example of what the answer was. Every session may be "unique" (within the limits of finite integers) but if you have that level of access to a version of the answer then maybe it wouldn't be that hard. History shows that, very often.

Pick two places in the world where I would go to get some serious maths (of the crypto kind) done...

My bank told me to contact my ISP if I had any privacy concerns. My credit card company didn't even bother to respond to my secure message. Not naming any names but :naughty: let's just say I think that Smile and Egg are a bit thick when it comes to stuff like this.

Dave

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I wonder if it might rattle BT's corporate cage if you asked them to publicly indemnify all consenting BT Webwise users should any legal proceedings be started against them? (Although if I remember correctly, you cannot enforce an indemnity against an illegal action?)

If nothing else, it might get somebody to evaluate the potential legal liability should all BT's privacy and legal research be overturned...

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

OK Update on the video. I just had a very long phone call with Simon who was good to his word and phoned me back. He assures me he is on the case with regards the video and we should have some official statement on it soon.

Alexander Hanff

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

The next question to follow up BT's answer on this one is along the lines of:..
"I showed your answer to website TOUGHGUYdotCOM and they said they specifically forbid me to visit their site and they also specifically forbid you to use their domain name in their cookie,and they said there was a notice to that effect on their site, and that if they saw me anywhere near their site with my Webwise rubbish, they'd sue the kilobytes off both me and my *!X$*|**! ISP - is it still safe to visit that site while signed up to Webwise?"

They amaze me - they seem to think that if they say it's legal then everything is okay no matter what any other party thinks.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

If they thought it was legal, they would be running the trial now.

One day, with all the cut and paste going on, they will make a mistake and send something out with all the legal/PR comments included.;)

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Has anyone seen or mentioned http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/04...rial_ad_firms/ yet?

"The Anti-Spyware Coalition has launched a review of Phorm, NebuAd, and other behavioral targeting firms that track user data from inside the world's ISPs.

Today, the ASC - a collection of anti-spyware companies, academics, and various consumer advocates - announced a new internal working group to decide how Phorm and the Phormettes will affect the organization's overarching policies on spyware....

[snip]

Phorm hasn't officially rolled out its service, but it has agreements with BT, Carphone Warehouse, and Virgin in the UK (though Virgin insists this does not mean it will actually use the service). Carphone has said it will ask for user consent before turning Phorm on, but the others have not. In 2006 and 2007, Phorm conducted trials on BT's network without telling customers diddly."

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I think Alexander has discussed it on Badphorm. There is also a 'related link' on the recent BBC pages to the Anti-spyware coalition.

ISP-in-the-middle attacks must be very fertile ground for them!

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I've been wondering about this. Why are BT et al allowed no access to the software running on the phorm box(s)?

From what we have been led to believe, all they are doing are some cookie placement, 307 redirects, ad placement and profiling of pages visited.

Cookies... duh!

307 redirects are a standard HTTP protocol mechanism.

Ad placement is just placing a pic in a given box based on a randomised or prioritised queue.

Profiling involves (from what I remember) removing chaff and generating a list of the most commonly used words on the page that was browsed and then categorising it.

None of this requires any commercially sensitive algorithms or coding. The whole system is actually pretty simple and I could probably have a good stab at writing it in a few hours.

There is NO reason why phorm could not supply the software to the ISPys in source code format and allow them to inspect the code and build and deploy it themselves.

Why the secrecy?

Why the apparent willingness of the ISPy network engineers to jeopardise potentially their careers and possibly time at her nibs's pleasure or loss of serious pocket money of the managers in allowing it?

I think we should be told.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I've mentioned before how as an IT professional I find it offensive and unacceptable that anything on my network's internal infrastructure should not be accessible to me to monitor, manage, report and audit. If I (and others who've commented on this aspect) are as aghast as we are then how the hell are ISPs falling for the "You can trust us" approach?

Everything on a network infrastructure has to have an audit trail or changelog of some description. It's basic management stuff. By allowing an alien presence on your network the ISP is leaving itself wide open to abuse by Phorm (or whoever the provider is) which it cannot track or do anything about.

It all comes back to the keywords of openness, honesty and transparency.

Let's rearrange that into Honesty, Openness and Transparency. The HOT test. We could add Respect into the mix and make it the THOR test. Personally I don't like the way the word "respect" has been twisted in common parlance, so I'll stick with the HOT test.

And right now I don't think Phorm gets anywhere near passing the HOT test.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Excuse me Mr. ISP. Can I put my box right in front of your pipe and you just give it all to me! i promise you'll have lots of money.

(Apologies for the crude euphemism but it just fits so well)

((Damn! :)))

I wouldn't allow it, if I was in charge of a major public network infrastructure. (any jobs going in that area yet? :))

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

http://www.phormdesign.co.uk/
[img]Download Failed (1)[/img]


http://www.phorm.com/
[img]Download Failed (1)[/img]

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Hmm, maybe somebody should contact them and point that out :P

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I don't know if this is an official site of phorm, if it is I got bad news for them it doesnt comply with the Disability Discrimination Act 1995, under Part 3 Discrimination in Other Areas under sekshon:
under this sekshon I believe the folowing apply:
(1) (a) (b) (c) (d)

under this sekshon I believe the folowing apply:
(2) (a) (b) (c)

under this sekshon I believe the folowing apply:
(3) (a) (b) (c) (f) (g) (h)

under this sekshon I believe the folowing apply:
I am not shuwre on this one, it may or may not apply

under this sekshon I believe the folowing apply:
I am not shuwre on this one, it may or may not apply

under this sekshon I believe the folowing apply:
Dosunt apply

This is the official site of phorm, I got bad news for them it doesnt comply with the Disability Discrimination Act 1995, under Part 3 Discrimination in Other Areas.

Got yer phorm by the unmenchabuls :D

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I think you would be hard pressed using the DDA against a web site. I am not saying it isn't possible but DDA generally refers to physical restriction to access services such as not having wide enough doors in your place of business to allow wheel chair access etc.

If DDA applied to web sites 99.999999999% of the websites out there would be non-compliant.

Alexander Hanff

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Done.
The WHOIS fits the page, shows the registrant located in Barnsley, South Yorkshire, and the company address is Sheffield. Somehow don't think that is Ertugrul's outfit!

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Hi Alexander, the DDA duz apply to web sites, I know this for a fact, me ben dyslexic I am entitled to take them to cort, under the DDA. :D

See this Eventure Internet
See the Royal National Institute of Blind People as well
:D :D :D

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Posted this over at Badphorm apologies if you seen it alread. p32 of the Charles Stanley report was interesting to me:


This document is a marketing communication.

This research has not been prepared in accordance with regulatory requirements designed to promote the independence of investment research.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Just got off the phone with vm who rang me to see what problem i had with phorm.

I explained what was happening why i didnt trust them and the guy was denying that they had undertook any trials with phorm then i pointed out that phorm had said themselves that all the 3 isps had undertook trials, then he changed story and said it only did trials on ex ntl area's (im ex-telewest) and they were fully inphormed about it before taking part.

Any ex-ntl'ers here who undertook or saw such a trial because first i have heard about it?.

further into the conversation he said if any future trials or deployment of phorm was done i would be fully inphormed i said he wouldnt need to as id be cancelling it straight away.
He also said that they have had lots of phone calls about the subject and were noteing and putting our points across to more senior positions.

The whole phone call just seemed a phone call to assure the customer that if anything happens you'll be inphormed, just wasnt reassuring enough for me sorry to say :(.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

That's earth rocking news. However we need to get that in writing. Once we have it in writing, then VM will be in as big a dog poo as BT.

Someone needs to alert the Register about this. . .

Ali.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

This is not news to me see #4779 by bold that bit is Rubbish they tested the system in Scotland.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

As with BT there needs to be full disclosure about any trials that have been carried out. What kind of and how was informed consent obtained (easy for BT; none), who was tracked, how many were tracked, how long the trials were, what was the user feedback etc.
Drip-feeding information just looks as if they have something to hide. The smart money is on that they do have something to hide.
A question for the more legally literate...if people find that they live in a trial area, can they submit a DPA request to find out what information on them was harvested? If the ISP replies that we don't know if you were Phormed or not, is it legally possible to make the case that the law has to assume the user was subject to this invasion of privacy? Furthermore, by extension, does the law then have to assume that every user in that area was subjected to data interception and processing simply because the ISP cannot fulfill the requirements of the DPA request?

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Good post dav. It is the legal approach that will stop Phorm or bring its plans to a grindingly slow pace. Share holders will continue to get the jitters and before you know it noone will touch this Company with a bargepole. In fact, if the penny hasn't dropped yet with potential investors that this is one very hot potato, then they deserve to lose all that they hoped to gain.

Let's not waste any more effort or energy on Phorm. The ISP's are respectable Companies that should respond to their customers wishes. They can remain solvent through our subscriptions, there's no need to be greedy and attempt to sell that which doesn't belong to them.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Just wrote a reply to todays phone call.

Today i recived a phone call from one of your customer support representitives regarding a query i had about the phorm system and any sort of secret trials and my concern at the matter. your represetitive said no trails had been held on virgin media yet when i pointed him to proof i have that phorm say that all 3 isp's with them have done
testing he said ahh yes we it was on ex-ntl (im ex telewest) and all customers were informed.
can i have written conformation by e-mail or hand that i was not affetected anytime in 2007 .
Can i also ask the area and time of this trial as i have resonable grounds to belive i was in some unknown to myself trial in 2007.
Many thanks.
(I have saved a copy of this and await your reply)

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I highly doubt that any Virgin Media customers who took part in the tests were informed about it, if that was the case, with all the publicity Phorm is getting right now, someone would have come onto these forums and mentioned it by now, plus its unlikely any ISP would roll out a system they hadn't fully tested first.

I don't think it should come as a complete surprise, other than in the fact that they are finally admitting what most Virgin Media customers have suspected for some time.

I wouldn't be surprised if this was just the tip of an iceberg and that their testing mirrored the tests carried out by BT, i imagine that the Carphone Warehouse did the same.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

But a covert trial by a third party albeit complicit with the network operator is tantamount to hacking isn't it? Hacking is illegal; or has everyone become free to intercept everyone else provided they legitimise it by calling themselves a forward thinking business? :D

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

As a Yorkshire-man I have contacted the South Yorks based company and alerted them to the issue. I don't see why they should risk being tar'd with the same brush! :)

Dunno if there's anything they can do, but they might want to add a note to their website...

Hank

---------- Post added at 12:43 ---------- Previous post was at 12:32 ----------

Well, I contacted my MP again following the release of the excellent legal analysis document. I enquired if she would consider signing Early Day Motion (EDM) 1311.

Now what I was not aware of, was that EDMs are used by backbench MPs to put pressure on the Government, and I was also ignorant of my Labour MP's role in this governemnt as a Parliamentary Private Secretary to one of the Cabinet.

So she is considered a member of the Government and as such it would be inappropriate for her to sign the EDM.

That said, she does put this in writing:

"I fully support the sentiment of EDM 1311 and share your concerns over the Phorm [Webwise] system."

She is awaiting a reply from DfBERR (since 10th April), in common with several people then (including the Earl of Northesk - they are very late replying now aren't they?)

More to follow then...

Hank

---------- Post added at 12:49 ---------- Previous post was at 12:43 ----------

As a BT customer for my internet connection, should I not be able to request my local Police force carry out an investigation into whether or not I was the subject of a crime by BT in 2006 or 2007?

I don't have any evidence, save for the fact that BT said they did do it, so although I do not have any evidence myself, surely the fact that they admit they did it is enough to suggest the police should interview someone from BT about it?

Comments anyone?
Hank

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I posted weeks ago asking if anyone had kept any PingPlotter traces from between the national outage (21 Dec 2007) and a few days after this thread started.

The reason I asked is because I had surfing difficulty during that entire period and on numerous occasions had run Ping Plotter to try and determine where the system was falling apart.

My first two hops ( (1) my router (2) the Modem\UBR) never resolve but there were definitely one or two extra unresolved hops on the front end eg before the first major network hop. I stupidly remember thinking why 4 not 2 unresolved hops but failed to even look up let alone save.

The placement of anything was either in the UBR or most likely the collective UBR's gateway (major city).

That period of time was rubbish surfing with lag and packet loss almost constantly. Magically it stopped within days of this thread and the surfing has been back at excellent speeds ever since.

I cannot provide any evidence for whatever happened but without doubt this thread was either coincidental or instrumental in getting the service back to normal.

If what I saw was a Phorm test then we have few worries because it cripples the service to such a degree that I insisted on an engineer's visit to tweak power levels and change the modem and then entered into a war with retentions. People will find what I endured intolerable and without doubt complaints will go through the roof with potentially thousands leaving. It really was that bad with stuck pages, part loaded pages and DNS resolution failures.

That "supposed" national outage was never explained, did not affect everyone and IMO was long enough to bolt on something we knew nothing about.

I am in an ex-NTL area.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Yep, I remember that period well. My connection went down in early December and was trash all through that month. The forums were rife with talk of National outage. Was there a VM/Phorm trial at that time? It certainly fits in with the modem LED's frantically firing but not able to lock on. I'm ex-NTL too.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Do you remember anyone posting any tracert info in those forums?

-------

http://www.cableforum.co.uk/board/34226371-post1.html

"I know it's within the NTL/TW/VM network because the IP before and after it belong to them."

Feb 07 though. It's probably worth having a good search.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

With the last few days news I'm now almost certain Virgin have done a trial, I do seem to remember a friend kept getting a reference to sysip, which if I remember right is a phorm domain. I was digging on the net to see if I could find any references to it on the VM network, I've had no luck so far but this forum has someone reporting a sysip problem on BT on June 28, which I think must be last year rather than 2006

http://hubbub.labs.bt.com/?pagename=viewpost&id=24712

also found something here relating to 2006/ 2007

http://forum.utorrent.com/viewtopic.php?id=25456

http://forums.digitalpoint.com/showthread.php?t=152409

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I've noticed a poll on ISPreview's website, http://www.ispreview.co.uk/, on whether or not users would leave their ISP if it adopted Phorm/Webwise. I was pleased to see that out of 748 votes 57.8% voted yes but amazed to see that the next highest number was 22.5% who asked what Phorm was. The message just doesn't appear to be getting out. I spoke to a young computer literate graduate today who makes great use of the internet and the web who hadn't heard of it. I've asked him and everyone I know to pass the word along and to educate others.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I see that the question posed by David Carnegie (Earl of Northesk) to the DfBERR has dropped off the unanswered questions list.

Two new questions are there on the list dated 24th April...

FIRST QUESTION... The one we all want answers to!!

Earl of Northesk to ask Her Majesty’s Government which law enforcement agency, Department or other statutory body has responsibility for investigating and prosecuting possible criminal breaches of (a) the Data Protection Act 1998, (b) the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000, and (c) the Computer Misuse Act 1990. [CO] HL3267

- "CO" - Which department is that then?

AND THE SECOND... The detail of the answer is eagerly awaited!

Earl of Northesk to ask Her Majesty’s Government whether any official or Minister in the Home Office has offered written or oral advice to any executive of the company Phorm as to the legality of their targeted advertising software product; if so, what was the advice; in what circumstances was it given; and what was the justification for giving it. [HO] HL3268

- "HO" = Home Office I'm sure.


How does it work? > http://www.parliament.uk/about/how/b...en_answers.cfm

And where is the answer to his first question?

Hansard, online here: http://www.publications.parliament.u...08042112001130

Monday 21 April 2008
Advertising: Internet
The Earl of Northesk asked Her Majesty's Government:

Whether they are taking any action on the targeted advertising service offered by Phorm in the light of the questions about its legality under the Data Protection and Regulation of Investigatory Powers Acts. [HL2635]

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (Baroness Vadera): The Office of the Information Commissioner made a statement on 3 March 2008 that it was in discussion with one company about the nature of its service and the way it uses information about ISP customers. My department will consider the continued relevance of the current safeguards and legislation in the light of the outcome of those discussions.

Hank

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I am ex NTL Manchester I wasn't inphormed of any trials by phorm if they did use this on me I will be very annoyed.. I had a time where pages were always timeing out or very slow loading...

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

If this turns out to be true, Virgin Media would be in the crap up to there collective necks. Considering that a Senior Manager of Virgin Media has stated on the Newsgroups that they did not carry out any trials on the live network just shows that they are willing to lie to save there own collective necks.

This is the quote for future evidence from the news groupsThe next few days are going to be interesting. As far as i am concerned if there is NO statement from VirginMedia from a Director about these alleged trials then i will honestly see it as a admission of guilt.

My reasons are simply that If a Director cannot categorically say that the trials never happened then they must be worried that they did.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Ravenheart - there are many examples of users connecting to sysip.net in 2006 and 2007. The ones I managed to contact were all BT customers. I could not find any from non BT ISPs but that may not be conclusive.

BTW, the most revealing thread was on the techimo.com site. I was in conversation with someone who knew exactly what BT were upto.

He suggested at the time (Jun/Jul 07) that BT were doing testing with 121media aka phorm.

Unfortunately that caused the site admin to pull the thread with no explanation. When I posted a new thread asking why the first thread was pulled that was pulled too.

I never managed to contact the person who posted up the connection with 121media and BT as the thread was deleted and I couldn't remember his username.

It was his suggestion of a deal which got me on the scent of BT and Phorm.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Is there any way for us to find out for sure if they have trialled this because i am ex ntl and i have never had a damn thing of VM about phorm or any system like it. If it turns out they have what action can we take because i sure as hell will not be happy if they run a trial of anything like phorm and didn't explicitly notify users. Maybe this is why VM are being so damn quiet all the time they can't say anything negative or bin the deal without phorm then making it public they ran trials without users knowledge or consent.