New Feature in iBurst (iBurst Browser Hijacking & more)

ambo said:
Whats wrong with a transparent redirect? It commonly used by many ISPs.
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Browser Hijacking: A browser hijacking occurs when a browser gets set to a website which is not the user's choosing. Sometimes information gets rerouted to another site without the user's knowledge and makes the Internet connection run slower.


Then I would like to know which ISPs those are as I will not be changing to them.

It doesn't matter how you achieve browser hijacking: malware or not. The fact of the matter is that this is browser hijacking and it is a source of user frustration that iBurst is trying to sugarcoat with some lame excuse.

It is unacceptable to redirect someone's browser. Doesn't matter if Santa Clause does it to save orphans.
 
Keeper said:
complaining?

well let me put it this way - the throttled uncapped was maybe the only reason why some people liked iburst - but now they are killing their only good idea with constant spam
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The throttled uncapped was THE only reason why I got iBurst instead of ADSL. If that goes, I will have no reason to stay on iBurst.
 
well it's not gone though :p

...just a bit.....annoying :erm:
 
One would think the non-savvy people wouldn't know how to set up a PPPoE connection or not use the dashboard.
 
Keeper said:
well it's not gone though :p

...just a bit.....annoying :erm:
Click to expand...

Well, feel free to install my browser hijacker and file a complaint. I've adopted a policy of filing a complaint for every 30 browser hijackings. Although I'm trying to keep it to once or twice a day.

It is easy to modify so it 'redirects' wherever you want it to. The page you were aiming for should be accessible through DOM. If I'm bored again I'll try to modify it so my browser hijacker redirects you to where you wanted to go, although I'd really appreciate it if more people could nag iBurst about this so they can realise what a silly idea this was.

The way I see it is whoever nags the helpdesk the most, wins. Either it's us or it's those who complain about slow internet speeds when they're throttled.
 
JustinB said:
One would think the non-savvy people wouldn't know how to set up a PPPoE connection or not use the dashboard.
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I don't kow how to set up a PPPoE connection, or how not to use the dashboard. But I can redirect/hijack my browser.
 
New and improved browser hijacker/redirector

iBurst browser hijacker script update

OK so I had a spare half an hour or so. If you do not want to edit your hosts file (that is, if you still want to access iBurst's website), you can install my new and improved browser hijacker/redirector script.

0. Ensure that you have Greasemonkey installed on Firefox:
https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/748

1. Install this simple script:
iburstblockerupdate.user.js

After you have Greasemonkey installed, you can just click on the link. You are welcome to view source and modify this script for your own purposes but you install it at your own risk. I don't try to do anything dodgy with my script, I just want to give you control of your browser again.

New features
And by features I mean functions that might actually be useful and what you want, not what is good for the greatest common denominator.

This script alerts you whenever your browser is being hijacked/redirected to iBurst's website. You then get the option of:
1. Navigating to the iBurst customer complaints form where you can complain about the browser hijacking.
2. Do nothing and stay on this page if this is what you want.
3. Trying to go back to where you came from.

The default is 3, trying to get back to where your browser was before. This gives you - the user - more control over what your browser does and where it is going. Imagine that, actually going somewhere you wanted to go with your own freaking browser.
 
I can understand the implementation of this "feature" it helps ease the load on the call center, and essentially nags the user to buy more bandwidth (business is business at the end of the day, you get nothing for free). But at LEAST, in the mean time, put a button on the page allowing the user to continue to their destination, it can't be that hard. =)
 
jannievanzyl said:
Point taken, the idea was to actually help with load on the call desk and the idea is still valid. But 30 (or 100) clicks was way too agressive. I've asked the guys that we try and change it to one per day as a 'quick fix' and we can then look at an opt-out.

But that will require changes to the very systems we're trying to stabilise, so I'm not too keen right now. (the current method is on a network engine and thus is not 'user-aware', while an opt-out system would need to know who you are and would thus need to integrate into iBOSS.)

Makes sense?
Click to expand...


A good idea that was implemented in a stupid manner.

Just disable it until you can put a proper solution in place with opt-out
 
It's not a feature. It's spam.

The Help Desk is meant to Help. If they are suffering from a big load, it tells you something about i) iBurst's service ii) iBurst's resources.

As a curiosity I wonder how busy the helpdesk is with complaints about this feature?
 
Anyone else who is annoyed by this spam feature, please try my script out. You might like it.

Also remember to drop a short, polite, succint line to the helpdesk to inform them that this is not the way to go. Once or twice a day should do it.
 
avert said:
or everyone can fire up their mouseclickers and bring their ****ty little idea to a halt.

http://www.softpedia.com/get/System/System-Miscellaneous/Mouse-Machine.shtml
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Wouldn't actually work unless you had a specialised site put up since while they say it monitors "clicks" that's only to make it easier to understand, since it doesn't run at the user level all it monitors are URL requests. So to use that tool you'd need a page that clicks through and then has another link in the exact same location to click through to again....but then it would be a really delayed process (since you'd have to wait for the page to reload - you can't really skip this bit because you need to be sure ibursts server gets the request) and that'd defeat the point of having an auto-clicker at all.

But yeah, I'm not so stressed about it anymore seeing that Jannie is determined to lower the annoyance level with once per day and click through implementation. Not perfect....but....better for certain.
 
ZombiePriest said:
It is unacceptable to redirect someone's browser.
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Really? The redirect header is a standard part of the http standard and its all explained in RFC 2616.

Browser redirects are standard and regularly used. Did you know that you go through a redirect every time you click a search result in Google? I'm sure I could find other examples for you if you want. :cool:
 
ambo said:
Really? The redirect header is a standard part of the http standard and its all explained in RFC 2616.

Browser redirects are standard and regularly used. Did you know that you go through a redirect every time you click a search result in Google? I'm sure I could find other examples for you if you want. :cool:
Click to expand...

My grievance is actually far simpler to understand than that. I'm talking about a browser hijacking redirect scenario.

When, for instance, you click on a search result in Google, your user expectation is that you will be redirected to a Google search result page. Right?

Not that your browser will inform you about the state of your cap. Right?
 
ZombiePriest said:
When, for instance, you click on a search result in Google, your user expectation is that you will be redirected to a Google search result page. Right?
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No, I would expect to go to the page that contained what I was looking for, instead Google bounces you off their own server so they can keep track of which result you clicked on.
 
ZombiePriest said:
It's not a feature. It's spam.

The Help Desk is meant to Help. If they are suffering from a big load, it tells you something about i) iBurst's service ii) iBurst's resources.

As a curiosity I wonder how busy the helpdesk is with complaints about this feature?
Click to expand...

5 by yesterday afternoon. (Last time I checked)

Time-based (once-a-day) should go in within the next day or so and will have a button to carry on to the requested site.

So you should see the screen at logon and after that once per day. And the screen will be as requested by the forum.
 
Basjohn said:
But yeah, I'm not so stressed about it anymore seeing that Jannie is determined to lower the annoyance level with once per day and click through implementation. Not perfect....but....better for certain.
Click to expand...
Looks like this will be done soon and then we can start working on an opt-out.
 
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