Vote

[Anonymouse]

Well, what ya know, the poll is from a Turkish forum. Observe my newbie brethren.

http://www.network54.com/Forum/231937

They have funny topics too if you wanna laff.

[Genuine_Stud]

Turkish forum huh.

I guess the spyware from their forums comes as a reward to the visitor too.

Freakin backstabbin gobble gobble bastards.

[TomServo]

Right now it looks like the majority opinion is yes.

[bell-the-cat]

Turkish forum huh.

I guess the spyware from their forums comes as a reward to the visitor too.

Avoid all network54 sites. They are well known to be vehicles for the spread of viruses and spyware and rogue dialers. That is how the company makes its money. I suggest you complain directly to network54 since they are the ones responsible, not whoever runs the website.

[hyebruin]

Avoid all network54 sites. They are well known to be vehicles for the spread of viruses and spyware and rogue dialers. That is how the company makes its money. I suggest you complain directly to network54 since they are the ones responsible, not whoever runs the website.

thanks for that tidbit, i did not know.

[bell-the-cat]

thanks for that tidbit, i did not know.

I should have said "avoid all free network54 sites". Those are the ones which have the pop-up adverts that often contain spyware, dialers, and other nasty things.
Ones where the site owner has paid network54 to get the adverts removed are OK - but they are in the extreme minority and you can't tell the free ones from paid-for ones until you actually visit the site.

[winoman]

Thousands Fooled in Web Scam


May 16, 2005

Baseless Genocide Recognition Poll Site Forwarded Globally

By Jenny Kiljian


On Thursday, May 5, a Web site polling visitors about whether they
believe the Armenian genocide should be recognized surfaced on the
Internet and the link began making its rounds to the inboxes of
hundreds of thousands throughout the world.

Often accompanied by urgent, frantic missives such as "The Turkish
community is distributing this link to get 'no' votes, please go and
vote 'yes,'" the Web site received more than 228,000 hits within three
days.

By Monday, May 9, the site was unavailable because the host server
could not handle the overwhelming number of visitors. Asbed Kassis, a
California-based IT consultant, researched what he called "the bogus
poll" and discovered that the person or group of people who built the
site are based in Virginia, and were using the telephone service
provider Cogent Company to access the Internet. The site was built and
hosted using Network54, which allows users to create and participate
in free forums, chat rooms and what are known in Web parlance as
votelets-easily generated survey and poll pages.

One visitor observed the poll about the Armenian genocide for 15
minutes and he, too, said it was ludicrous. Jirayr Beugekian, IT
manager for the Hairenik Association, said that while the 'yes' votes
changed with each individual click, the 'no' votes remained largely
static, jumping in periodic increments of 300 at a time. This signaled
to him that the person hosting the site was manipulating the 'no' vote
by hand, simply to make the poll appear credible.

The 'yes' clicks were not all unique, however, as thousands were
informed through further emails that a visitor could delete 'cookies'
from a computer and return to the site to vote 'yes' multiple times,
according to Beugekian. Cookies are short pieces of data used by web
servers to help identify web users. They don't damage files or
systems, and are only used to identify users and track browsing
habits.

While sites such as this might seem innocuous, both Kassis and
Beugekian advised people to be more careful about where they point
their browsers. This Web site, like many others, contained
Google-sponsored advertisements and search results at the top of the
page. Each time a person visited the site, the person hosting it
earned a commission from the hugely popular search engine.

"Several IT people have confirmed that the person was making money
from the poll," said Kassis. "Since huge numbers of Armenians and
others flocked to the site, he or she got this high rating for
traffic. The way this person made money was by getting a percentage of
the amount charged for the advertisers per click."

While this site contained visible advertisements, similar scam Web
sites, explained Kassis, will embed pop-up-generating codes into
nearly every link on the site. A visitor might simply close the
pop-up, not thinking of it as more than the occasional nuisance that
comes part and parcel with surfing the World Wide Web. What these
people don't realize, Kassis said, is that they're not only polluting
their computer, but their clicks are generating revenue for the host.

A person could build a Web site and place numerous advertisements on
the pages, each netting him or her anywhere from a penny to 30 cents,
or even more, per visitor or click, explained Beugekian.

By the time the poll site became unavailable on Monday, the person
hosting it could have made anywhere from $15,000 to $30,000 through
the clicks of visitors. Although it is unclear whether the user simply
deleted it or Network54 took the site down, Kassis said that people
should send complaints to the host companies when they see such
questionable sites. "The best way to get trash like this off the host
is to email Network54 with complaints. I've seen this to work 90
percent of the time," he said.

The Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA) sent a letter to the
site expressing the organization's concern over the host being used to
campaign against Genocide recognition.

"This abuse of your Web site-much like similar efforts by Holocaust
deniers-aims to create doubt about historical realities," wrote ANCA
executive director Aram Hamparian. "Sadly, we still have among us
those who, for their narrow interests, seek to sow hatred and
confusion about the Holocaust, the African slave trade, the internment
of Japanese Americans during World War II, the genocide in Rwanda, and
many other facts of history. It is up to all people of good conscience
to reject hate and to not provide a platform to its purveyors."

Many others, while displeased that Genocide denial has been furthered
through technology, were less sympathetic to the exponential number of
people who visited the site and forwarded the link to hundreds of
others in their respective address books.

"I can't believe Armenians would fall for this, and jump to it as if
all our future existence depends on it. We have become so very limited
with our Genocide past," said Katia Peltekian. "There is nothing on
the page about what the purpose of this poll is, who is collecting the
votes, for whom this voting is being done, who is going to use this
poll. The 'no' votes make no move while the 'yes' votes have jumped
tremendously from almost zero to above sixty-one percent since
[Friday, May 6], when Armenians in a panic began forwarding this
message left, right and center."

Nyree Derderian of California saved each email that was sent to
her. In all, she said, she received the link 142 times.

"There are new kinds of predators out there in this new world," said
Tatul Sonentz-Papazian. He received the link to the site, but said he
summarily deleted it. "People are gullible, and they shouldn't be so
gullible. They become tools in the hands of those scam artists-people
are falling for it, and it's ridiculous."


--
Jenny Kiljian is the editor of The Armenian Weekly.

[ckBejug]

Just wanted to emphasize:

By the time the poll site became unavailable on Monday, the person
hosting it could have made anywhere from $15,000 to $30,000 through
the clicks of visitors.

Oh jeez.

[TomServo]

Someone set up us the bomb.