Quote:
Originally Posted by Ryewolf
I use AVG, which has an inline link checker for all search results on the major search engines, it's completely free and updates automatically, and gives visual clues to the safety of the links on the page. Best of all it doesn't require me to having my entire browsing history profiled.
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I am thinking of blocking all visits whose visit profile looks like they are using AVG as it is using 2 visits before the human sees the page - 3 times bandwidth cost.
Problem is, all those visits from Google could be human or they could just be the AVG script - no way of knowing. Have to just ignore the increase in traffic, factor it down by 3 and know that I am getting near to real visitor numbers.
BT will be upset by AVG too as they will be being hit for interceptions made by AVG on BT customer accounts. But then, that is what happens when you allow people to use software that spoofs someone else's IP address.
AVG currently use just one useragent, so it is possible to eliminate the scrapper visits. However, they are planing on removing that identifier as they want to minimise the risk of phishing sites giving the script a clean page and sending the human to the malware page.
If you use AVG, trust it about as much as you will trust Webwise and its ability to protect you from phishing.
Common sense, that is the best protection.
Never click on ads - they are used to redirect via malware sites before sending you on to the real site (since before April 2007, to my knowledge). AVG only checks the final destination URL and does not follow all the redirects from the ad (else they would be generating as many 'fraudulent clicks' as they are phantom visitors)
Sorry, slightly off topic. Just shows that if you are relying on someone's software to protect you, it is only as good as the control mechanisms programmed into it. And if it annoys the innocent, you may find yourself tarred as guilty by association.
BlueCoat offer similar, and it is free. Webmasters only need to contact BlueCoat who will then cache your sites once and fit it into a category: else they do the 2 scrapping visits before human visitor too. At least BlueCoat uses its own IP address so visits are easy to track.
Rant over.