AVG LinkScanner Toolbar Putting Additional Traffic on Websites
I have been seeing some interesting reports today about AVG's newest toolbar prefetching pages to test for malware. It is apparently loading every page in search results and claiming to be MS Internet Explorer 6.
There are several articles against this new feature. I am personally against it. LinkScanner actually disguises itself as a legitimate browser and inflates our traffic reports. I don't need AVG scanning my websites for malware, so I would prefer to block their user agent, or better yet, redirect it to their own site. But wait, can't webmasters hosting malware do the same thing? Yes they can, and that makes it a faulty feature IMO. The only way for them to be undetectable would be to randomize their user agents and lie about who they really are. Below is a snippet from one of the linked articles. What do you guys think about it?
So to combat this I've just put the following in my .htaccess file to redirect these requests from AVG linkscanner back to the AVG web site
Note this should allow valid IE 6.0 users through as they will have a non blank referrer and some other parameters in the user agent string like ".NET" and so will not match the rules below. Of course if I can match it, so can the Malware sites, ho hum.
#Here we assume certain MSIE 6.0 agents with no referrer string are from linkscanner
#redirect these requests back to avg in the hope they'll see their sillyness
Rewritecond %{HTTP_USER_AGENT} ".*MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1; SV1.$" [OR]
Rewritecond %{HTTP_USER_AGENT} ".*MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1;1813.$"
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} ^$
RewriteRule ^.* http://www.avg.com/?LinkScannerSucks [R=307,L]Hopefully more people will do this, and so show AVG the error or their ways more quickly.
greg posted this at 10:56 — 29th June 2008.
He has: 1,581 posts
Joined: Nov 2005
Regarding personal security
I just fixed a PC for a mate, installed the free avg for them and didn't notice the toolbar was included in the install.
I found it when I loaded the browser, and was a little annoyed to be honest.
I know everyone should be protecting themselves, and with new and more sophisticated spyware and malware being developed each day, we should be sure we are up to date with defending against it all.
But there has to be a line drawn somewhere, otherwise our PC and internet usage is nothing more than spending a few hours waiting for security to load.
A bit like going sunbathing in an astronauts space suit.
So for me the AVG toolbar is just another company trying to spread their products everywhere - just like symantec's world domination plan.
It might stop one or two things a year, but the local cpu usage and slowing down the browser isn't worth it. Especially with the fact it causes bandwidth usage on websites and gives false site hit reports.
The product's intended purpose and architecture is something you expect from a small software company with little knowledge/experience in the large corporate world, but not from someone like AVG who must surely have had developer meetings with managers/technicians and heads of dept you would expect to have said "It does what? That's ridiculous. We can't scan websites before results are shown on google, who thought of that? Send them their P45 (pink slip)"
If you install extra security you expect it to be MORE protection, not add another potential risk itself and have added complications to users and websites who have no control over it.
Just like the new zonelabs toolbar. I clicked yes when I installed zonelabs firewall on my friends PC, as it sounded like an unintrusive decent checking option. Then I fired up the browser and every result in Google from my search had a big green tick next to it from the zonelabs malware site checking toolbar
For basic internet browsing a decent AV and firewall should be enough, and also using Firefox with the Adblock makes a solid combination of defence against spy/malware.
A check once a fortnight with a few decent anti-malware/spyware tools and there should be no need for anymore.
I haven't had any spyware or malware in the last year and I do sometimes visit "crack and serial/keygen" websites (for friends of course *cough*).
From a webmasters view
It does what?
To be honest, if it's joe bloggs, jane smith or AVG site scanner accessing my website I don't really care, as long as it ALWAYS deems my site to be 100% safe and never mistakenly states otherwise it makes no difference to me.
I can see however where this could be a real problem to large sites with a huge amount of search engines returning their website as a result for searches.
Let's just hope and pray this instant initial bad publicity will nip it in the bud. It's just another farcicle software tool designed by a bunch of people who, considering what their job will entail, should have known better.
decibel.places posted this at 16:19 — 29th June 2008.
He has: 1,494 posts
Joined: Jun 2008
I have used Avast av for years I do not think it does any prefetching
Want to join the discussion? Create an account or log in if you already have one. Joining is fast, free and painless! We’ll even whisk you back here when you’ve finished.