Privacy products and cookies

[xsiteu]

Surfers are increasingly looking for products to protect them while surfing.

Just a week ago I clicked on a porn link I found in a google search and got some nasty spyware that I spent about four hours trying to get rid off. I have both Spybot Search and destroy and Adaware which I only run as scanning tools. I thought running them once a month was enough. This spyware / adware shit is getting much worse and more aggressive.

I also work in the IT Support industry and I hear this from clients also.

As more people experience nasty spyware they will seek protection.

Many sponsors use cookies to pass on link codes. If more and more uses are exposed to nasty shit more and more of them will be protecting themselves with products that are not friendly to Adult Webmasters.

This is the dilemma of the Adult Industry.

I have created a new site promoting Internet Privacy and Safety products but have reservations about promoting the privacy products that might actively remove cookies while you surf.

I know they all remove cookies but I would not want to promote any that did it while you were actually surfing thus removing any possibility of a sale.

Those that either did it on demand or perhaps when the surfer closed their browser would be acceptable.

These are the products I am looking at promoting:

Evidnence Cleaner Gold
Pal Popup ELiminator
Exit Killer Pro
Popup Nuker
Pop-Up Stopper Professional

I have put them up but holding back on promoting the site until I find out more about how they work.

Does anyone have any information on these or input on this topic in general.


My new site is Adult Safe Surf

[urb]

I read that Symantec is now a market leader in software security products, and their products are currently being shipped with a very large percentage of new PCs.

Norton Internet Security's installed settings do the following:-

1) Block banners, banner rotators, Adsense links and some affiliate link codes.
2) Won't display anything which is behind a hotlink .htaccess.

Norton ships with 2 settings enabled, non-savvy surfers are never gonna touch these settings:-

1) Privacy Control
2) Ad Blocking

So, imagine for a minute that you are Joe Surfer, passing by a link list or search engine to find exactly the kind of gallery or free site you have been looking for.... but oh dear, the images are not there.... and all that is left is the placeholder where the banner should be and maybe some text to click on.

What will he do? Back up his browser or click on your text link cold without seeing any pics to warm him up?

What percentage of surfers do you suspect are using Norton and not questioning the Privacy settings?

How many 3rd party cookies are being blocked?

Our industry is in danger of getting caught up in the same drag net as the spyware/adware business.

I keep telling people about this... but I guess you all think I'm crazy.

[Freeway]

What Joe surfer should do is get a mac and start having fun with his computer again....

[urb]

Originally posted by Freeway
What Joe surfer should do is get a mac and start having fun with his computer again....

Yep, Macs are almost bullet proof.

But the fact remains that Joe Surfer's far more likely to visit your sites on a PC with some kind of security software that is not porn webmaster friendly.

[Useless]

That damned Norton is definately kicking us in the ass. I discovered their ad blocking several weeks ago while I was showing a friend one of my sites on his computer. Site loaded beautifully, just no ads or logo. I had stored the site's logo and ad banners in a directory aptly entitled 'banners'. I damned near flew home to rename that directory. Who knows how many visitors arrived at the site to see that there wasn't even a logo present?

I have since delved into his securty settings and found a HUGE list of ad-related words that Norton filters out of the source coud. I've started renaming everthing with off the wall shit that those bastards could never possibly mistake as advertising?

The surfers using that stuff will never even know what they're missing. It'll be a bitch though when it comes time to do their online shopping and they can't find anything on the ecommerce sites.

[xsiteu]

I seem to have opened up the add blocker can of worms. I hate those things too and have noticed that they now come standard in most Firewall products for some stupid reason and are switched on by default.

To name a couple - Outpost and Zone Alarm

I first noticed it at a clients and I knew that he was not adverse to paying to join up to sites (and he is loaded). Very sad to see.

He does not know that I also do adult sites so I could only protest in the most passive terms.

Anyway I have thought about this and the answer is in the following line from Useless Warrior.

"delved into his securty settings and found a HUGE list of ad-related words that Norton filters out"

The answer is to use this against them. If you made site navigation dependent on viewing buttons stored in directories or with names that would be filtered out. Such as the ENTER button.

or better still and this one would be easy. PUT all your pics thumbs into a directory called banners. Beautiful.

We can fight back against these add killers.

Its the affiliate codes I am really worried about.