The Pop Up Piggyback

Is it just me, or have these interstitial ads or whatever they call themselves suddenly become ubiquitous, and no less annoying for it? They now seem to be everywhere (even O’Reilly uses them, shockingly, although it does offer a way to disable them). These are ads, courtesy of companies like Vibrant Media IntelliTXT, that add … Read more

From the Ashes of Blue Frog

The Blue Frog may be no more,  but the vigilantes are. Seems that despite the death of Blue Security in the face of a spammer’s wrath, the service has built an appetite for fighting back. Eric B. Parizo of SearchSecurity.com reports on a new independent group called Okopipi who intend “to pick up where Blue … Read more

The Blue Frog Burps His Last?

Bobbie Johnson, technology correspondent at The Guardian is reporting that Blue Security is killing off the Blue Frog, saying it “could no longer continue to operate in the face of an escalating threat to the internet from a malicious Russian spammer known only as PharmaMaster.” The Blug Frog had been under serious attack from PharmaMaster, knocking … Read more

Mapping Trends With Google

Google’s new Trends search is a lot of fun, and useful too. See how some things have taken off over the past couple of years, like Web 2.0: and Wikipedia (the lower graph is for volume of related pieces on Google News, the upper for ordinary Search): while others, such as WiMax, are more gradual: … Read more

Spammers Get Authenticated

Until now, most spammers sent their stuff through open relays — Internet-connected computers that were either unprotected, or else had been compromised by viruses or trojans into sending the spam without the owner being aware. But that is changing, says AppRiver, and it has big implications for how spammers work and may render useless today’s … Read more