tdaxp

Two strange messages (I've left them in tact, except for the hyperlink) have appeared in the comments for my posts, Dozier Internet Law harms client's reputation and Did Dozier Internet Law Misrepresent a Federal Judge?."

The first comment reads:

Here is the Dozier Internet Law Blog:

[url redacted by tdaxp]

Frankly, it seems pretty insightful.

and the second is:

I don't know who is right. It looks like it might be Dozier:

[url redacted by tdaxp]

At first blanch, these are merely spam messages. The IPs of the two comments (left with the same nick and email account) are quite different... the 128.241.*.* range resolves to NTT America (a "global IP solutions company"), while the range of 207.195.240.0 to .255.255 resoles to Global Tac, LLC. Global Tac has been implemented in spam messages before. It appears that Global Tac hides behind150 different IP messages to conduct its spam campaigns, so the discrepancy between the IP addresses is smaller than it appears.

Dozier Internet Law is no stranger to spam as a means of advertising - they've long generated spam websites with nonsensical information. Still, escalating this to include spam comments on private blogs comes dangerously close to trespass and hacking.

As I reported on Jim River Report, Brendan has more on Dozier Internet Law's use of spam advertising. Brendan's post has screenshots of many of the more absorb attempts to increase their google pagerank. Here's the best:



"Sponsored listings" include Dozier Internet Law (We protect online reputations and the intellectual property of business), Earn A Law Degree Online (Accredited Law Degree 100% Online. Bachelors Required. Apply Today!), NY Internet Law Lawyers (Internet law, media, technology, and licensing matters), and Domain Theft? (Don't let someone steal your url. Experienced internet attorney).

Other "related" searches include theory pants, internet law, theory suits, theory jackets, law school, theory sweaters, technology law, law, theory skirts, and business law.

Earlier today I described a typical DirectBuy spam website. Further investigation that spam is playing a larger role in the propagation of DirectBuy in the wake up Dozier Internet Law's incompetent bullying on their behalf than I thought.

The blogs mentioned below are spam blogs, meaning that the are created by computer algorithms. They steal content from other sites, sometimes linking back to the original site, and display oversized ads to generate revenue. "Good" spam blogs are those that at least are helping spread the word about Direct Buy's tactics (however unwittingly). "Bad" spam blogs appear to be set up by DirectBuy in an attempt to squelch public participation. The "ugly" ... well, read on:

The Good
"Business Teacher" links (twice!) to my post on Donald E. Morris while displaying an oversized google ad.

"Internet & Web-Related Blog Feeds" links to Dozier's history of unhappy clients.

"Lemon Law Directory" is a strange spam blog with no ads (I guess it is used to link to other spam blogs -- it appears to be both automated and "clean") that noticed by full-text of the 'copyrighted' cease-and-desist." "Puykif" links to the same post.

The Bad
"Recommender: Shopping Questions and Answers" appears to have an astroturf "question" that directs readers to dynamic appointment, a front organization for DirectBuy.

The Ugly
Adisgusting spam site has a post titled "Hacking is Wikipedia? DirectBuy" that uses a half-paragraph from my article, "Is DirectBuy Hacking Wikipedia?" to display a large photo advertisement of "Adult Friend Finder members near New York." (Even worse, of the twelve females shown, only one is actually attractive. Eek!)

DirectBuy, a company that specializes in high-pressure sales tactics and suing bloggers, also creates spam pages and spam domains. I won't link to them because these cookie-cutter websites clog up search engines, but searching for, "DirectBuy - Tulsa" and "DirectBuy - Los Angeles" will reveal exactly what I am talking about.

Each spam page appears to be identical, except for the town name and some randomly generated material. On top is a "DirectBuy" logo, followed by a horizontal menu with "Home," Remodeling," "Building," and other links, ending with "Free Visitor's Pass." The left side menu has entries such as "Home Furnishing," Home Improvement," and" Kitchen Remodeling" and a link to "News Articles" (which are press releases -- mainstream media news articles about best buy are less positive). There is also a "Member Testimonials" (sic) that includes an unverified quotes saying good things about the company.

The main body of the page has a sizeable flash animation, the left two-thirds of which are pictures of products you can presumably "buy direct" at DirectBuy, while the right one-third contains the text "Achieve your dream home for much less that you'd except! - Find out how at DirectBuy. Request a Visitor's Pass."

The rest of the body of the page has nearly identical text. The format appears to be "Direct Buy of CITY has helped people just like you save thousands of dollars since 1971. With [number of showrooms] in CITY, you too can have the power..." &c.

A word should be said about visitor's passes, which are mentioned several times on the front page(s). The "pass" concept is part of a high pressure take-it-or-never-come-back sales approach that is described elsewhere in the blogosphere and also by Consumer Reports.

Blogspirit introduced a new anti-spam feature today which allows blogger to ban specific IPs. This is pretty nifty, but it coincides with an enormous increase in traffic spam. I wonder if this is either a weakness in the new system, or the revenge of some blogger who suddenly finds that his old methods of vandalism do not work.

A full list of Internet Protocol addresses (IPs) I've banned so far are below, but it appear that most spam comes from only a few sites:

212.158.16?.*
212.24.3?.*
217.23.13?.*
62.213.6?.*

While (edited) examples of the trackback spam are:

hockey Sabres hockey club Sabres
point Four point bed Four
screen Hot screen names Hot
sonia Lady sonia photo Lady

That the spam is coming from the same pattern (Word1 Word2 Word1 Word3 Word2) means that (a) the spam is coming from the same source and (b) the spammer is a poet.

Weird, no?

I'm getting a lot of trackback spam with the title "Colomarine post," apparently uniquely identified to make it easier to see where it worked. The Blog name in each if "Colomarine blog," and the content is always "all about Colomarine and top news." The IP address is 62.213.55.79, though strangely the Blog URL reads "http://www.yahoo.com"

So what is colomarine? When I search for "Colomarine -blog" I get only 44 results, and they all seem to be to a family name.

Well, it happened again.

 

Poker comment spam.

 

The latest message was

 You can also visit the pages dedicated to blackjack blackjack

 

Other sites so hit on gambling, poker, or other comment spam include

• The National Debate
  (http://www.thenationaldebate.com/blog/archives/2004/10/ms...)
  
• Howard Greenstein
  (http://www.howardgreenstein.com/cgi-bin/mt-tb.cgi?__mode=...)
  
• Warren Ellis
  (http://www.warrenellis.com/index.php?p=650)
  
• The Daily Scoop
  (http://www.stonyfield.com/MT-STATIC/mt-tb.cgi?__mode=view...)
  
• CY Leow's Photoblog
  (http://www.jeffooi.com/MT3/mt-tb.cgi?__mode=view&entr...)
  
• Falconred Goes to Law School
  (http://falconred.llarian.net/mt-tb.cgi?__mode=view&en...)
  
• Anthony's Photo Blog
  (http://www.outshine.com/poetry/trackback.php/193)
  
• Chop Stix and Forks
  (http://www.chopstixandforks.com/cgi-bin/mt-tb.cgi?__mode=...)
  
• U-Blog Tribulations
  (http://u-blog.net/tribulations/note/57445)
  
• weezBlog
  (http://weez.oyzon.com/index.php?/weezblogtemplates/trackb...)
  

So, in that spirit, here are some links to help

Get help with blackjack addiction

Get help with freeroll poker addiction

Get help with free slots addiction

Get help with mit blackjack addiction

Get help with pacific poker addiction

Get with with poker addiction

Get help with texas holdem addiction

Get help with winning gambling systems addiction