Malicious Advertising and Music Piracy: A New Zealand Case Study

Watters, Paul A.; Watters, Maya F.; Ziegler, Jacqueline

doi:10.1109/ctc.2014.13

Cited by 3 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 12 publications

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“…Many of the undertaken academic works have discussed which elements have the strongest impact on the order of organic results. These include the analysis of links (Bifet et al, 2005;Fortunato et al, 2006), contents (Evans, 2007;Moreno and Martinez, 2013) and IP addresses (Strzelecki, DMCA reports and requests can also be used to remove graphics from search results (Sag, 2017) as well as check what advertisements are displayed to users on websites that have already been reported to the search engine and are included in Lumen (Watters et al, 2014). In the vast majority of cases, these are high-risk advertisements (Watters, 2013), i.e., those including malware, gambling, false software, websites installing software, etc.…”

Section: Search Engine Results Pagesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The Google search engine takes into consideration the opinions of copyright owners and introduces changes in its algorithm, including changing the functioning of the auto-filling mechanism (Bridy, 2016). DMCA reports and requests can also be used to remove graphics from search results (Sag, 2017) as well as check what advertisements are displayed to users on websites that have already been reported to the search engine and are included in Lumen (Watters et al , 2014). In the vast majority of cases, these are high-risk advertisements (Watters, 2013), i.e., those including malware, gambling, false software, websites installing software, etc.…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Website removal from search engines due to copyright violation

Strzelecki

2019

AJIM

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Purpose-The purpose of this paper is to clarify how many removal requests are made, how often, and who makes these requests, as well as which websites are reported to search engines so they can be removed from the search results. Design/methodology/approach-Undertakes a deep analysis of more than 3.2bn removed pages from Google's search results requested by reporting organizations from 2011 to 2018 and over 460m removed pages from Bing's search results requested by reporting organizations from 2015 to 2017. The paper focuses on pages that belong to the .pl country coded top-level domain (ccTLD). Findings-Although the number of requests to remove data from search results has been growing year on year, fewer URLs have been reported in recent years. Some of the requests are, however, unjustified and are rejected by teams representing the search engines. In terms of reporting copyright violations, one company in particular stands out (AudioLock.Net), accounting for 28.1 percent of all reports sent to Google (the top ten companies combined were responsible for 61.3 percent of the total number of reports). Research limitations/implications-As not every request can be published, the study is based only what is publicly available. Also, the data assigned to Poland is only based on the ccTLD domain name (.pl); other domain extensions for Polish internet users were not considered. Originality/value-This is first global analysis of data from transparency reports published by search engine companies as prior research has been based on specific notices.

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Section: Search Engine Results Pagesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Website removal from search engines due to copyright violation

Strzelecki

2019

AJIM

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“…High risk ad categories include malware, downloading sites, gambling, scams and the sex industry. Studies into high risk ads have been undertaken within many countries in the Asia Pacific, including Australia and New Zealand [5]. The results of these studies have been used by governments, NGOs and the private sector to guide appropriate policy responses, including regulation (whether by government or by the advertising industry itself), as well as building awareness around the risk of visiting these sites, especially by children.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This provides independent verification 2 of the rogue nature of such sites, but it does not always follow that the most-complained about sites are always the most popular, particularly in local language sites. This is the approach utilised by Watters et al [5] for a New Zealand case study. The second approach focuses on the most popular sites.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A National Council against Piracy and Intellectual Property Crimes (CNCP) has the overall remit to promote intellectual property rights through education, enforcement and policy initiatives. 5 Additionally, concerns regarding online child exploitation and trafficking have frequently been expressed by Brazilian law enforcement, Government and NGOs [12]. In a recent operation (Operation Darknet), 55 people were arrested in Brazil for participating in a significant CEM "ring".…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Investigating Malware Epidemiology and Child Exploitation Using Algorithmic Ethnography

Watters

2018

Proceedings of the 51st Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences

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A number of recent studies have investigated the role that advertising plays in funding and sustaining piracy sites. In this study, the composition of advertising on piracy websites hosting Child Exploitation Material (CEM) in Brazil was analysed, measuring both mainstream and "high-risk" ads 1 using samples generated from the most-complained about sites, as well as the most popular sites, using algorithmic ethnography. The results indicated that high-risk ads pose significant problems for Brazilian users, especially children, who may be harmed by exposure to ads promoting the sex industry, gambling, scams and malware. Links between Brazil-focused piracy websites and CEM are documented. Policy options for dealing with this issue are discussed. CEM poses a threat not only to the children depicted in it but also to children who might be exposed to it. Indeed, any viewer who is exposed to CEM may experience adverse psychological and behavioral consequences.

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Unveiling the Connection Between Malware and Pirated Software in Southeast Asian Countries: A Case Study

Iqbal,

Aman,

Rejendran

et al. 2024

IEEE Open J. Comput. Soc.

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Pirated software is an attractive choice for cybercriminals seeking to spread malicious software, known as malware. This paper attempts to quantify the occurrence of malware concealed within pirated software. We collected samples of pirated software from various sources from Southeast Asian countries, including hard disk drives, optical discs purchased in eight different countries, and online platforms using peerto-peer services. Our dataset comprises a total of 750 pirated software samples. To analyze these samples, we employed seven distinct antivirus (AV) engines. The malware identified by the AV engines was classified into four categories: adware, Trojans, viruses, and a miscellaneous category termed others. Our findings reveal that adware and Trojans are the most prevalent types of malware, with average infection rates of 34% and 35%, respectively, among our pirated software samples. Notably, our evaluation of AV detection performance highlights variations in sensitivity, ranging from a high of 132% to a low of 30% across all AV engines. Furthermore, upon installing pirated software, the most adversely affected operating system settings are the firewall and user account control configurations. Given the potential for malware to steal information or create malicious backdoors, its high prevalence within pirated software poses a substantial security risk to end users.

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Malicious Advertising and Music Piracy: A New Zealand Case Study

Cited by 3 publications

References 12 publications

Website removal from search engines due to copyright violation

Website removal from search engines due to copyright violation

Investigating Malware Epidemiology and Child Exploitation Using Algorithmic Ethnography

Unveiling the Connection Between Malware and Pirated Software in Southeast Asian Countries: A Case Study

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