All Advertising Questions

[Howard Mass]

sixsixsix,

I believe the section is mainly stuff sports fans like ourselves might like.

[Sofia]

I accidentally clicked on one of the ads at the bottom and it opened an article with videos about 'balloon porn'.

I was at home but still closed it right away because I don't want to see that ****, but I imagine if anyone happens to make the same mistake as me at work, their bosses/it administrators may not look too kindly on it...

Edit - I also get the same hunting links as mentioned by above posters.

[CR Reina]

I accidentally clicked on one of the ads at the bottom and it opened an article with videos about 'balloon porn'.

I was at home but still closed it right away because I don't want to see that ****, but I imagine if anyone happens to make the same mistake as me at work, their bosses/it administrators may not look too kindly on it...

Edit - I also get the same hunting links as mentioned by above posters.

This advertiser eliminated all of the suggestive ads, so I'll ask them why in the world that would be a link.

[Sofia]

Thanks Reina, in the past hour I have noticed ads I hadn't seen before (albeit one telling me to imagine a world without sex) so they may have made some changes and removed the ad I referred to in previous post.

[Sofia]

Back again. To be specific, it's called 'My life online: Grim Looner'

[BadMofoPimp]

Every once in a while, when I click on a forum, only a Milky Way picture comes up by itself from here.

http://forums.realgm.com/boards/search.php?search_id=egosearch

Once or twice, this image actually showed up in the middle of the page on a team board underneath the text like a background image.

[CR Reina]

Every once in a while, when I click on a forum, only a Milky Way picture comes up by itself from here.

http://forums.realgm.com/boards/search.php?search_id=egosearch

Once or twice, this image actually showed up in the middle of the page on a team board underneath the text like a background image.

Can you take a screenshot if you see it again? I haven't had that image appear.

[Rasho Brezec]

Any board or thread I click on, my antivirus program (AVG) informs me it found a virus at the following address:

http://www.fangraphs.com/not/wp-includes/js/im.js

After googling that site, it seems to be baseball related. I'm using adblock, so the only common denominator to all of the pages I click on is either the social media share buttons at the bottom of the page or that weird "Personalized for you" section that links you to external articles.

Actually, looking at the source code, the placement of it is unusual. It's in the basketball section of the wiretap, line 169:

Code: Select all

<li style="width: auto; padding-left: 15px; display: list-item;"><a href="http://basketball.realgm.com/wiretap/231969//" style="display: inline;">Thunder Hope Russell Westbrook Returns On Thursday Against Heat<script type="text/javascript" src="http://www.fangraphs.com/not/wp-includes/js/im.js"></script></a></li>

[BadMofoPimp]

Every once in a while, when I click on a forum, only a Milky Way picture comes up by itself from here.

http://forums.realgm.com/boards/search.php?search_id=egosearch

Once or twice, this image actually showed up in the middle of the page on a team board underneath the text like a background image.

Can you take a screenshot if you see it again? I haven't had that image appear.

I been out on vacation a few days and visited only sporadically during work today as it has been busy. If it shows up again, will let you know. Thanks -BMP

[CR Reina]

Any board or thread I click on, my antivirus program (AVG) informs me it found a virus at the following address:

http://www.fangraphs.com/not/wp-includes/js/im.js

After googling that site, it seems to be baseball related. I'm using adblock, so the only common denominator to all of the pages I click on is either the social media share buttons at the bottom of the page or that weird "Personalized for you" section that links you to external articles.

Actually, looking at the source code, the placement of it is unusual. It's in the basketball section of the wiretap, line 169:

Code: Select all

<li style="width: auto; padding-left: 15px; display: list-item;"><a href="http://basketball.realgm.com/wiretap/231969//" style="display: inline;">Thunder Hope Russell Westbrook Returns On Thursday Against Heat<script type="text/javascript" src="http://www.fangraphs.com/not/wp-includes/js/im.js"></script></a></li>

We had this issue for a day or two back in 2012 as well. Our web host is working on figuring out what's going on and completely eliminating it.

[YFZblu]

For my fellow RealGM posters, I have a word of caution regarding those JavaScript detections:

In and of themselves, these are not "viruses". Sure, your AntiVirus solution will flag it as malicious and let you know about it, but ultimately these are simply JavaScript files that perform a function within the browser - pull content from another site, write an applet to the page, etc.

If the JavaScript is indeed malicious, this is only the first step in the chain of compromise. Often times what will happen here is the User will be redirected by a malicious piece of JavaScript to an exploit kit's landing page - a web server setup by the bad guys with the explicit purpose of fingerprinting your browser and plugins, and serving exploit code if it believes you may be vulnerable. At that point the malicious web server will attempt to exploit your browser, Java, and/or Adobe Flash player - among other things...but those are the big three.

Anyway, my main point is this - Often you will see AntiVirus products claim to have caught these JavaScript files in time so they were not processed by the browser, protecting the victim computer - but really, this may not be the case. If you receive a JavaScript malware detection, pay close attention to its detection name in your antivirus. If it was a 'Facebook Liker', then we may not care so much; however if you Google the name of the detection and it mentions exploit kits, downloaders, or droppers, immediately perform a full comprehensive scan of your machine. Exploit kits are capable of silently dropping malware onto victim computers, and are serving some sophisticated badness these days.

I don't say this to freak anyone out - but RealGM generates a large amount of 3rd party traffic and these types of encounters are basically inevitable over a long period of time. That being said, RealGM deserves a lot of credit for being so responsive with User reports and resolving these issues when they are aware of them.

1. Always update your OS, your browser, and its plugins - Sure, we could all still get owned by a zero-day, but the chances of encountering a zero-day exploit in a drive-by download are extremely small.
2. Take those detections seriously, and do some digging - Find out what it is. Be prepared to kick off a full scan to be sure.

Stay safe!

[BadMofoPimp]

Just an FYI from a long time visitor. These advertisements have gotten out of control. Now, they are showing up in the middle of posts which is annoying as hell in a very bad way. Makes me want to stay away. Seriously. That about pisses me off.

It was bad enough that I have to use Pop Up Blockers, turn off Java and Flash to visit RealGM there are so many ads, but this makes ESPN seem like a very safe website. At least they don't have pop-ups and sometimes Trojans (occasionally you get them here). I don't visit many websites outside the very safe ones, so this is a big deterrence for me to continue visiting here.

[CR Reina]

Just an FYI from a long time visitor. These advertisements have gotten out of control. Now, they are showing up in the middle of posts which is annoying as hell in a very bad way. Makes me want to stay away. Seriously. That about pisses me off.

It was bad enough that I have to use Pop Up Blockers, turn off Java and Flash to visit RealGM there are so many ads, but this makes ESPN seem like a very safe website. At least they don't have pop-ups and sometimes Trojans (occasionally you get them here). I don't visit many websites outside the very safe ones, so this is a big deterrence for me to continue visiting here.

RealGM doesn't have any popups of any kind. We also don't have any ads that automatically play sound or are expandable over the content. We do our best in keeping a tight line in both of those areas, as well as the low quality 'Belly Fat' type of ads.

Which ads are you referring to that are appearing in the middle of posts? Unauthorized ads occasionally come through and we always want them removed as much as you do.

[RoundMoundOfRebound]

Are the adds that automatically play sound/commercials going to be a permanent fixture? I like to listen to music on laptop and they can be quite intrusive.

[BadMofoPimp]

Which ads are you referring to that are appearing in the middle of posts? Unauthorized ads occasionally come through and we always want them removed as much as you do.

This only happened during the transition you all had done last week right when it was happening. Then, it went away. Evidently, there were advertisements in between peoples posts that day. It may have been an experiment on your part that didn't jive.

[RoundMoundOfRebound]

What is this new "message from our sponsors" that takes you away from realgm to an add for 30 seconds?

[Howard Mass]

Are you still getting this?

[loscy]

Ad with link to nhl.com with automatic sound, no clicking involved leads to this webpage:

http://www.nhl.com/ice/eventhome.htm?lo ... romo-video

This link is for a "You are the 100,00th visitor! No Joke! Congratulations!" type websites. I'm not sure if this is intended. 95% of people know this is not real and probably some sort of scam, but there is that 5% that doesn't. And if after a few minutes it just changed now to a " your PC performance is poor. Repair Windows errors." ad.

http://nym1.ib.adnxs.com/click?AAAAAAAA ... gBMNfvxJsF

http://nym1.ib.adnxs.com/click?AAAAAAAA ... gBMLjtxJsF

[Howard Mass]

Ad with link to nhl.com with automatic sound, no clicking involved leads to this webpage:

http://www.nhl.com/ice/eventhome.htm?lo ... romo-video

This link is for a "You are the 100,00th visitor! No Joke! Congratulations!" type websites. I'm not sure if this is intended. 95% of people know this is not real and probably some sort of scam, but there is that 5% that doesn't. And if after a few minutes it just changed now to a " your PC performance is poor. Repair Windows errors." ad.

http://nym1.ib.adnxs.com/click?AAAAAAAA ... gBMNfvxJsF

http://nym1.ib.adnxs.com/click?AAAAAAAA ... gBMLjtxJsF

loscy,

Are you still getting these?

Please let me know.

Thanks!

[ghostinthepost]

For the past week+ a video ad pops up in the right corner every time I open the home page.