Making Money From Spyware

Spyware often messes with the HOSTS file on Windows machines to redirect URLs to machines they control. It has been suggested they could redirect bank sites and phish login details to steal money – which is clearly illegal. However, there is one possibly-legal way to mess with the HOSTS file and still rake in the cash.

Google’s advertising success makes them a big target – what would happen if some spyware used HOSTS to redirect ads.google.com (or whatever domain they use) to the spyware owner’s adserver? They’d sign up advertisers and get placement on a massive number of websites with no effort…

4 thoughts on “Making Money From Spyware

  1. Installing any such HOSTS-changing spyware without the user’s consent would still be illegal though.

    Google could possibly have a case against the spyware vendor. I seem to remember some cases where companies like Gator were sued for replacing ads on websites with their own. Can’t remember the outcome though.

  2. This could be a very interesting legal case. There’s two things going on. 1) google would be lossing revenue from blocked ads and 2) the user would be subject to ‘unwanted’ ads (as if ads are ever wanted). The second one isn’t something Google could sue for because they didn’t recieve any damages from that. However, Google might be able to sue for the first one, but how is that any different from a suit against, say, Adblock? As far as Google is concerned, they both do the same thing.

  3. @Alan: “but how is that any different from a suit against, say, Adblock? As far as Google is concerned, they both do the same thing.”

    The important difference to note is that Adblock is only installed at the user’s choice. They go to the website, download it and install it. With HOSTS-changing spyware, the user doesn’t get a choice as it is installed in the background. Google cannot possibly sue Adblock or the people using it as in the end, it is the viewer’s choice whether they want to see ads or not, but spyware may be blocking ads where users wouldn’t mind seeing them.