His crime? Cookie stuffing.

[Kaido]

Pretty good article.

TL;DR: Dude made $5.2 million off hijacking eBay affiliate clicks. Currently in court getting sued by eBay.

 

[waggy]

wow. didn't know that was going on.

 

[Tweak155]

That's what you call a business man.

 

[unokitty]

That's what you call a business man.

Interesting.

If I understand the article correctly, when eBay couldn't make their civil suit stick they convinced the FBI to bring a criminal suit.

Would be interested in hearing other opinions or hearing about other similar suits.

Uno

 

[Kaido]

Interesting.

If I understand the article correctly, when eBay couldn't make their civil suit stick they convinced the FBI to bring a criminal suit.

Would be interested in hearing other opinions or hearing about other similar suits.

Uno

On the flip side, it's sort of respectable in a cool way, like an epic bank heist - I mean, I've never heard of anyone injecting cookies to hijack affiliate clicks for eBay, let alone heard of anyone making millions off something like that - all completely invisible to the end-user and existing only in the Matrix.

Makes you wonder how much other stuff is going on that you don't know about

 

[DrPizza]

On the flip side, it's sort of respectable in a cool way, like an epic bank heist - I mean, I've never heard of anyone injecting cookies to hijack affiliate clicks for eBay, let alone heard of anyone making millions off something like that - all completely invisible to the end-user and existing only in the Matrix.

Makes you wonder how much other stuff is going on that you don't know about

You have no idea how much trouble we had with cookie stuffers here. Lots and lots of them banned, removed, etc.

 

[preslove]

He should have moved to a carribean country with lax extradition laws, lol.

 

[WT]

You have no idea how much trouble we had with cookie stuffers here. Lots and lots of them banned, removed, etc.

Patiently awaiting the 'AT Forums - the true behind the scenes stories' ebook from our mods, coming soon via digital download. Dirt sells, you guys could take an early retirement and then things would go to Hell in a hurry around here.

 

[TwiceOver]

Ack. Scheme worked too well. If he would have been able to scale it back he could have gone unnoticed for who knows how long. Unfortunately it seems he was dependent on the popularity of other people's websites, which were too popular.

And yeah, kinda a cool "bank heist" feel to it.

 

[Kaido]

You have no idea how much trouble we had with cookie stuffers here. Lots and lots of them banned, removed, etc.

Wow seriously? The ARS article was the first time I'd ever heard of something on this scale. That's crazy!

 

[Kaido]

Ack. Scheme worked too well. If he would have been able to scale it back he could have gone unnoticed for who knows how long. Unfortunately it seems he was dependent on the popularity of other people's websites, which were too popular.

And yeah, kinda a cool "bank heist" feel to it.

One thing I remember from childhood, after watching some thieves get caught on TV or something, was asking my dad why criminals were so stupid when they could have been more careful and not have gotten caught. He looked over and simply said - the smart ones don't get caught. Me:

 

[Anonemous]

how do we make sure we aren't getting 'stuffed'? Clear cookies?

 

[Newbian]

It looks like they were doubled stuffed also.

 

[kalrith]

Ack. Scheme worked too well. If he would have been able to scale it back he could have gone unnoticed for who knows how long. Unfortunately it seems he was dependent on the popularity of other people's websites, which were too popular.

And yeah, kinda a cool "bank heist" feel to it.

It reminds me a little bit of Superman 3 when he pulled up in his expensive sports car.

 

[Krazy4Real]

Hmm... how do I know if I've been stuffed? :hmm:

 

[Jeraden]

The culprit:

 

[Puppies04]

Is it just me inebriated state or does cookie stuffing sound like some sort of sexual perversion?

 

[allisolm]

You have no idea how much trouble we had with cookie stuffers here. Lots and lots of them banned, removed, etc.

Exactly. Sorry to hear that someone got away with it to such an extent.

 

[Newbian]

Is it just me inebriated state or does cookie stuffing sound like some sort of sexual perversion?

You are thinking of double stuffing.

 

[ViRGE]

Wow seriously? The ARS article was the first time I'd ever heard of something on this scale. That's crazy!

Indeed. What most of you guys aren't aware of is that inline images can be used to achieve cookie stuffing, since most you have inline images enabled here.

A scumbag will setup a server (typically on a .info domain for some reason) with a number of fake images on them. Said scumbag will then either use bots or turkers to have the fake images posted in various forums as an inline image so that client browsers attempt to load them.

When a browser attempts to load an image, the server will run some logic to try to figure out if they've nabbed you before, and if not they will redirect the image request to a business's website, using a URL that includes their affiliate ID. The business's website in turn will send back a cookie with the affiliate ID, which your browser dutifully accepts and saves. Of course for the browser this was supposed to be an image request and it didn't get an image back, so you either see an empty image box or more often you see nothing. Alternatively, if you have been nabbed before the fake image will come up blank, or they will actually load an image (usually an emoticon) to make it look legit.

So when you see those nonsense posts from newly registered members, sometimes those posts are coming from cookie stuffers. Unfortunately what most of you are not seeing is the fake inline image they're using to stuff you.

 

[SMOGZINN]

Poor, Poor Cookie...

 

[arrfep]

Poor, Poor Cookie...

He did it all for the cookie.

 

[Puppies04]

You are thinking of double stuffing.

Not right now but......... oh hell yes I am, you caught me.

 

[ioni]

Ack. Scheme worked too well. If he would have been able to scale it back he could have gone unnoticed for who knows how long. Unfortunately it seems he was dependent on the popularity of other people's websites, which were too popular.

It's the details that get ya http://www.hark.com/clips/kqzhmmqzvm-i-must-have-put-a-decimal-point