Hover-over pop-up ads: Update 12

Posted by Trinkwasser on January 7, 2013 05:29 pm 90

[Ads have also been confirmed by Verge support and other readers - Germany, Austria, Netherlands, Denmark, France,... Australia is not getting these exact ads, but equally bad ones. Yes, they are really served by Vox Media and their ad network]

Also check out threads from other users about this: (although my updated post sums them up all)

Enjoy:

The Verge would never approve such ads, but they are still serving those ads to certain non-US/non-UK countries through European ad networks. Some Vox Media Ad managers need to sort this out or get fired.

Users have already confirmed these ads across iOS, Android, Linux, Mac OS and Windows. Tested across browsers and across Internet Service Providers.

Tested through my home internet connection, tested through my mobile carrier (on iPhone and on Laptop tethered to iPhone) and tested on school PC with completely different internet provider as well. No Tor, Proxies or VPN used. Tested with different DNS servers as well. No extensions enabled.

Me and other German/Austrian readers only get ads every few days but I think European Verge readers in non-English speaking countries only get (legitimate) ads every few dozen page loads?

hover-over pop-up ad (Video from Steamblader, since it is better than mine):

YouTube Playlist I created: Verge ad gems German and Austrian readers are enjoying since 2013:

iOS:

iOS redirects: [Thanks Firefly 7475]

Linux:

Android:

via cdn0.sbnation.com

Flash ad with sound (as soon as you load the page, no hover-over needed)

Poker ad + legit beautiful Surface ad.

acceptable flash ads and unacceptable flash ads

Linux: Having fun with dozens of pop-up ads:

Oh and just a small side note: Adblock is disabled and Ghostery found 54 different services! Seriously Verge? WTF? 54 different services? I know they aren't all trackers but most of them are. To be fair, this only happened once though . When I refreshed the page they were back down to 11-13 services. I am not complaining about this (yet). Sort out your horrible ads you have been serving to certain countries in the last 3-4 months first.

Back to normal:

Ok, back to the ads:

condom ads
poker ads
ads that play a sound without hover-over
pop-up ads on hover-over
ads with sound on hover-over

Nearly all of them are served by adnxs.com (nearly all unacceptable ads, some acceptable flash ads from local shops and sometimes - but rarely - ads for some kind of charities).

Sometimes I get legit (beautiful) ads (Surface, Samsung,..) from a different domain and rarely I get AdSense ads (served by Google.)

Adnxs.com is engadged in the distribution of Malware:

Here is one inspected page element/html file:
http://pastebin.com/CYqL39Bd
The flashing ad is embedded at this position: (use ctrl+f to find the position in the above html file.

<iframe frameborder="0" width="300" height="250" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" target="_blank" scrolling="no" src="http://ams1.ib.adnxs.com/if?enc=U9SZe0j41D8Tjg9pCtPRPwAAAAAAAPA_E44PaQrT0T9S1Jl7SPjUP0FsMzQDWmkG6UXS7BDE-WeRSOtQAAAAABA9DwAmAwAANgUAAAIAAABjz0IADLgCAAAAAQBVU0QAVVNEACwB-gDaUQAA9DoAAgUCAQUAAIQAUyKuxwAAAAA.&cnd=%21XSTZrgiD5DMQ456LAhgAIIzwCjAAONqjCUAASLYKUJD6PFgAYBFoAHAAeACAAQKIAQCQAQGYAQGgAQGoAQOwAQC5AQAAAAAAANA_wQGET8l4SPjUP8kB3OKwBLGq6T_ZAdEi2_l-aug_4AEA&udj=uf%28%27a%27%2C+67368%2C+1357596817%29%3Buf%28%27c%27%2C+848387%2C+1357596817%29%3Buf%28%27r%27%2C+4378467%2C+1357596817%29%3Bppv%2846847%2C+%27461999406589373505%27%2C+1357596817%2C+1358806417%2C+848387%2C+178188%2C+0%2C+0%2C+1209600%29%3B&ccd=%21fwWVMAiD5DMQ456LAhiM8AogAA..&vpid=31&referrer=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.theverge.com%2F2012%2F12%2F18%2F3778922%2Fwunderlist-2-task-list-update&dlo=1"></iframe>

The ads served by adnxs.com ads are mostly targeted region-specific since I get ads for German speaking people.

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Watch the other videos first, but in case you wondered - nope, they are not gone: