Zango abandons PC Tools adware lawsuit
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Adware classification rumpus Controversial adware outfit Zango has withdrawn legal proceedings against anti-spyware firm PC Tools. The decision follows its failure to persuade a court to issue a temporary restraining order that would have prevented PC Tools from classifying Zango's software as potentially malicious. Both firms hail the outcome of the case as a victory.â¦
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A U.S. Internet marketer has agreed  to stop inundating computers with unwanted "spyware" that can  disable users' computers while he fights a lawsuit from the  U.S. Federal Trade Commission.
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ICANN, the body responsible for the internetâs domain naming system, has convinced a court to dismiss an antitrust lawsuit filed against it by domain registry VeriSign over its interference with the launch of VeriSign&#39;s Site Finder service.
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After a security firm revealed that a popular Facebook third-party application contained a Zango spyware download, the social network has removed it--1.5 million installs later.
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Zsa Zsa Gabor's lawsuit against her daughter over family money has been dismissed.
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Crudware maker 'unlikely to prevail on the merits' Poor Zango can't seem to get a break. The creator of Hotbar, Seekmo Search Assistant and other adware programs of dubious value has already ceded one lawsuit against Zone Labs and agreed to pay the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) a $3m fine to settle a formal complaint stemming from deceptive downloads.â¦
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AutoPatcher, a popular alternative to Windows Update, was shut down today in response to a cease-and-desist e-mail from Microsoft.
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In yet another indication that the U.S. market for PDAs is losing momentum, Sharp Electronics has announced it will stop selling its Linux-based handheld computer -- the Zaurus SL6000 -- in the United States.
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A civil suit filed in Florida by Dell and its Alienware subsidiary is giving insight into the enormous sums of money that can be made by creating Web pages full of advertising links.In October, Dell sued a group of domain registrars, alleging the companies bought more than 1,100 domain names with trademark-infringing characteristics, such as &quot;dellbatterrogram.com&quot; in order to put advertising links on the pages.The practice, known as&#160;typosquatting, is illegal. It&#39;s intended to draw unwitting Web surfers to pages with URLs (uniform resource locators) that are similar to legitimate sites, and then redirect them to other sites. The owners of these Web sites get revenue from advertising referral programs every time a link is clicked.The defendants -- Belgiumdomains, Capitoldomains, Domaindoorman, Netrian Ventures, iHoldings.com, Juan Pablo Vazquez, and 10 unnamed defendants -- deny the claims. Dell contends the businesses, most of which are registered outside the U.S., are shell companies engaged in collusion.Dell sought a court order in November to freeze their assets so the money from their operations wouldn&#39;t disappear. Last month, the court amended the freeze order, and contained in the details of the new order are clues to just how much money the defendants may be raking in.Google, whose AdSense advertising-placement program was used to monetize the domains, was ordered to hold in a special account the first $1 million collected on behalf of the defendants each month. The second $1 million that accrues in the account every month will be given to the defendants. If more than $2 million accrues in one month, the money is split between the defendants and the Google account.Google takes a cut of AdSense revenue, which shows that it in part benefits from this kind of abuse of the Internet. However, Google recently announced it will not allow AdSense campaigns on &quot;kited&quot; domains.Kiting is a technique used by some rogue registrars to avoid having to pay the fee for using a domain. The domain is repeatedly registered and unregistered within a five-day Add-Grace Period. The grace period, which applies to a handful of TLDs (Top Level Domains) was intended to let people get a refund of their domain registration fee if they made a spelling mistake.Kiting often goes hand in hand with another abusive practice, &quot;domain tasting.&quot; A domain name is registered and monitored during the grace period to see if it gets sufficient traffic to pay for its registration fee. The domain owners then get refunds on the sites with low traffic. However, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers&#160;(ICANN) is considering keeping a $0.20 fee&#160;it normally refunds as part of the registration process in order to stop tasting.Dell has accused the typosquatter defendants in its lawsuit of both practices and is claiming their profits as well as $100,000 per infringing domain used.Google&#39;s antikiting policy doesn&#39;t apply to domain tasting, meaning the company will still potentially benefit from Web sites intended merely for advertising. A Google spokesman said Tuesday, however, that Web sites are supposed to have legitimate content in order to be accepted into AdSense.Other information in the court documents shed light on the economics of monetizing domain names. Dell contends the defendants control some 1 million domain names, and believes they also have used at least 64 million other unique domain names.When the court froze the defendants&#39; assets in November, it also froze their ability to stop renewing domain names that weren&#39;t producing enough revenue to justify the registration fees. Since the defendants controlled so many domain names, the automatic renewal of those names -- likely around 3,000 domains a day -- cost them $20,000 per day.However, the defendants successfully petitioned the court to cancel domains that were generating less than $8 a year in revenue.&quot;These [figures] tell us that there&#39;s lots of money in tasting, and it&#39;s a game of huge volume,&quot; wrote John Levine, a consultant and author of &quot;The Internet for Dummies&quot; on his blog.The Dell case continues in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida.&#160;
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A lawsuit accusing Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's chief strategist of illegally intercepting e-mails has been withdrawn and the legal battle between him and former associates has been resolved, the parties said Wednesday.
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A US District Court Judge has dismissed the anti-trust and conspiracy claims made by the .com and .net registry, VeriSign, against the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names &amp; Numbers (ICANN).
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Following in the footsteps of other electronic giants, Sharp has decided to discontinue sales of its Zaurus SL-6000 in the US market, although the company will continue to support current users in the United States.
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(InfoWorld) - Two consumer protection groups are asking the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to investigate FastMP3Search.com.ar, a Web site that distributes software that can be used to search for digital music on the Web. The FastMP3Search plugin disables the Windows Firewall, installs adware and Trojan horse programs, and generally hobbles the user's PC, said John Palfrey, the Harvard Law School professor who is StopBadware.org's co-director. The software is also virtually impossible to remove once installed, he added. StopBadware.org and the Center for Democracy and Technology plan to file a formal complaint with the FTC on Thursday. "We are asking the FTC to take a close look at an application that we consider to be the worst of the bad applications that we've seen over the course of the last year," Palfrey said. Representatives from FastMP3Search.com.ar could not be reached immediately for comment. The Web site is registered to a company called Direct S.A., based in Buenos Aires, according to the Network Information Center Argentina domain name database. StopBadware.org was also unable to reach representatives from the company before filing its complaint Palfrey said. The company's Web site tells users that the software will provide a fast way to search the Internet for downloadable music files, "in exchange for your agreement to also install our plugin software, which may occasionally display ads on your computer." Although the FTC has sought court orders to shut down Web sites in the past, the fact that FastMP3Search.com.ar appears to be based in Argentina complicates matters, Palfrey admitted. Still the FTC has worked on international efforts to fight spam and online fraud. "When an application is hosted outside of the U.S., but is plainly affecting U.S. consumers, they can coordinate with other governments," Palfrey said. "We would hope that they would start an investigation of this application." FTC representatives could not be reached immediately for comment. Formed earlier this year with funding from Google Inc. Lenovo Group Ltd., and Sun Microsystems Inc., StopBadware.org has issued reports on dozens of software products that engage in questionable or downright malicious behavior. It has exposed problems in everything from Kazaa to the Jessica Simpson Screensaver, to AOL LLC's free client.
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A California district court has shut down a controversial Web site in the U.S. that allows whistle blowers to p...
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(InfoWorld) - Cingular Wireless, Priceline.com, and Travelocity.com have settled with New York State's attorney general after the state accused them of contributing toÂ the spread of adware. The companies agreed to pay fines and take steps to help keep adware off users' PCs but did not admit guilt in the case. It marked the first time law enforcement had held advertisers responsible for ads delivered via adware, according to a statement by Attorney General Andrew Cuomo's office. DirectRevenue actually installed the adware, which monitored users' Web activity and collected data they typed onto Web forms in addition to delivering ads, the attorney general's office said. The adware was very hard to remove from PCs, it alleged. The stateÂ sued DirectRevenueÂ in April 2006 but found that the three big-name companies and others had paid the third party hundreds of thousands of dollars to have their ads delivered via adware, it said. The attorney general found the companies engaged in deceptive business practices. "Advertisers can no longer insulate themselves from liability by turning a blind eye to how their advertisements are delivered," Cuomo said in a prepared statement. Under the agreement reached Monday, the advertisers will have to ensure any company that delivers their ads online does the following: -- discloses the name of any adware program and bundled software; -- brands each ad with a prominent brand name or icon; -- describes the adware and gets the user's consent to download and run it; -- makes it practical for users to remove the adware; -- obtains consent to keep sending ads to users who used to have the adware on their systems; -- make their affiliates meet all these requirements. The three companies also will make payments for penalties and investigatory costs, the state said: Priceline and Cingular will each pay $35,000 and Travelocity will pay $30,000.
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The Web portal Lycos Europe on Friday terminated a spam-fighting campaign that had been criticized as a breach of Internet civility.
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Lycos Europe&#39;s controversial anti-spam advertising campaign has been discontinued after only three days due to charges that it promotes vigilantism.