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11-04-2006
Microsoft outs typo-squatting menace
John
E. Dunn, Techworld.com
Microsoft
has released an Internet Explorer plug-in that reveals the true scale
of the phenomenon of squatting popular URLs with misspelled
equivalents.
A domain
can be typed into the Stryder URL Tracer tool and used to generate all
the misspelled sites -- the "typo neighborhood" as Microsoft terms it
-- that are hanging off it. These can be analyzed in some detail,
including sub and linked domains, and blocked if desired.
According
to the company, the technique of registering typos of popular domains
has turned into a good business thanks to Google's AdSense for domains
program.
AdSense
is a free service whereby Google will bring up ads for inactive or
"parked" domains, and is widely used by so-called "typo-squatters" to
generate ad traffic from domains registering using any one of a
multitude of common misspellings.
These can
promote a range of unrelated services including, in some cases, porn,
spyware and phishing. The majority of them appear to be with
registered using a small number of domain-parking services, including
at least one owned by Google itself.
The
number of domains that can be generated from one popular URL is vast.
As well as missing or adding characters near the beginning or end of a
URL, they can also use missing dots between address fields, and random
character permutations within the address.
The more
popular and established a domain, the more likely it is to attract the
interest of the typo domain squatters. Washington Post and Slashdot
are two domains that appear to generate a long list of squatting
domains, while even Microsoft itself has been targeted by the domain
squatters.
"Our
Typo-Patrol work proposes the first automatic and systematic approach
to discovering and analyzing typo domains and typo-squatters," the
authors of Microsoft's detailed report on the subject states.
"We
encourage parking services that are really serious about enforcing
their policies to use our tool to discover systematic typo-squatting
domains that participate in their parking programs and to identify
large-scale typo-squatters among their customers," the paper
concludes.
The tool
can be downloaded from the Microsoft website (installation requires IE
6.0 and version 2.0 of the .Net framework).
Source: PC World
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