AVG Fakes User Agent, Floods the Internet 928
Slimy anti-virus provider AVG is spamming the internet with deceptive traffic pretending to be Internet Explorer. Essentially, users of the software automatically pre-crawl search results, which is bad, but they do so with an intentionally generic user agent. This is flooding websites with meaningless traffic (on Slashdot, we're seeing them as like 6% of our page traffic now). Best of all, they change their UA to avoid being filtered by websites who are seeing massive increases in bandwidth from worthless robots.
Hooray (Score:5, Funny)
ACID (Score:5, Funny)
I bet AVG would score higher on ACID than IE...
Re:How do you really feel? (Score:5, Funny)
Ok. It's run by Jews in a secret conspiracy to take over the World using sharks with frickin' lasers and gorgeous fembots with a penchant for evil.
"as like" (Score:5, Funny)
> on Slashdot, we're seeing them as like 6% of our page traffic now
Come on Taco... proper English (or at least something seemingly like it) isn't that hard... is 6% exactly, around 6% or really just 'like 6%'
I honestly like, do not recall like the last time I like, saw someone use 'like' in that long standing improper way in like text, it's always like, been for me, like only something a person like, verbalizes.
My ex wife.... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:F5 IRule (Score:5, Funny)
Re:My ex wife.... (Score:4, Funny)
....used to fake user agents all the time.
You mean she called out other browsers' names during sex? Weird.
Re:I discovered this the hard way (Score:2, Funny)
and none of them were downloading the CSS or image files that they should have been.
So they don't load anything that could possibly install a virus on your computer when doing these checks?
Sounds to me like this is a bit of really useless functionality that will just eat up your bandwidth.
Thanks AVG. You've just confirmed to me that all antivirus software is pants.
are you sure it's avg_free_stf_xxxx.exe (Score:5, Funny)
Shouldn't it be avg_free_stfu_xxxx.exe ??
Re:One Word (Score:3, Funny)
Gimme a break.
I download movies for free.
I download music for free.
I download porn for free.
I download operating systems for free.
I download software for free.
Why shouldn't I expect antivirus software to be free as well?
Re:HOWTO install AVG without Search Crawling (Score:5, Funny)
At a Command Prompt window, type /REMOVE_FEATURE fea_AVG_SafeSurf /REMOVE_FEATURE fea_AVG_SafeSearch
c:\downloads\avg_free_stf_xxxxxxxxxx.exe
where c:\downloads\avg_free_stf_xxxxxxxxxx.exe is the full path of your AVG 8 installer.
At least it is intuitive....
-Em
Re:How do you really feel? (Score:5, Funny)
In this day and age it's sad to see that anti-sharkitism is still alive and well.
AVG = Alotta VaGina?
Re:payback (Score:5, Funny)
so we don't know what readers are actually interested in
Porn. Anime. Sometimes computers.
Hope that alleviates your concerns.
Re:One Word (Score:5, Funny)
Re:F5 IRule (Score:3, Funny)
Re:F5 IRule (Score:5, Funny)
You've got an actual Ass Hat? Where'd you get it? I could order a couple hundred because a lot of people deserve them.
In fact, let's spam the White House and Congress with a million Ass Hats. I'm sure some enterprising person could design a hat that resembles the south end of a north-bound mule.
Re:Sure AVG's not slimy... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:F5 IRule (Score:3, Funny)
header ('HTTP/1.1 301 Moved Permanently');
header ('Location: '."http://www.grisoft.com/");
Re:Sure AVG's not slimy... (Score:4, Funny)
...or a .50 cal to get rid your "rodent" problem.
Pansy. I use a mortar. It works especially well on burrowing rodents.
Re:One Word (Score:5, Funny)
Nuke 'em from orbit (Score:2, Funny)
it's the only way to be sure
Re:Sure AVG's not slimy... (Score:5, Funny)
No, its the equivalent of taking a flamethrower to all your neighbor's houses because you think there might be a wasp flying around.
Oh, come on! Who hasn't done that?
Re:F5 IRule (Score:4, Funny)