ISPs May Be Hijacking Your Searches

By Saturday August 6, 2011

And people worry about anonymous tracking by Google and others. Your ISP has access to everything about your online life. Beyond this relatively benign hijacking practice, what else are ISPs doing with it?

Searches made by millions of internet users are being hijacked and redirected by some internet service providers in the US. Patents filed by Paxfire, the company involved in the hijacking, suggest that it may be part of a larger plan to allow ISPs to generate revenue by tracking the sites their customers visit. It may also be illegal.

Reese Richman, a New York law firm that specialises in consumer protection lawsuits, today filed a class action against one of the ISPs and Paxfire, which researchers believe provided the equipment used to hijack and redirect the searches. The suit, filed together with Milberg, another New York firm, alleges that the process violated numerous statutes, including wiretapping laws.

The hijacking seems to target searches for certain well-known brand names only. Users entering the term “apple” into their browser’s search bar, for example, would normally get a page of results from their search engine of choice. The ISPs involved in the scheme intercept such requests before they reach a search engine, however.



14 Comments
  1. sargasso_c says:
    8/6/2011 at 5:57 am

    I wish them luck with their class action. Commoditising customers, turns them into a product, which is basically the MO of every information & social media enterprise. ISPs are only trying to join the party.

  2. tdkyo says:
    8/6/2011 at 7:45 am

    Use HTTPs, always!
    https://encrypted.google.com/

  3. msbpodcast says:
    8/6/2011 at 7:58 am

    I saw this happen on Cox in Fla. and on ComCast in NJ.

    I’d like to start something tracking the problem of hijacked search sites (beyond capturing ‘404’ errors.)

  4. bellhaven says:
    8/6/2011 at 8:03 am

    How the hell do you figure Google tracking is anonymous? Google’s cache of info is enormous, and yes, bigger than your ISP.

    Gmail — not anonymous
    Google Calendar — not anonymous
    Google Docs — not anonymous
    Google Contacts — not anonymous
    Google Plus — voluntarily tell google even more about your life, very not anonymous
    Android — location information your home ISP doesn’t have, not anonymous
    Google Checkout — your purchases, even the encrypted transactions your ISP can’t sniff, not anonymous
    Google Voice — who calls you — not going thru ISP’s network

    I’m waiting for the Google bank to round out their total knowlege of every part of your life. I am much less scared of my ISP. Google’s entire business model is about data mining.

  5. Uncle Dave says:
    8/6/2011 at 8:07 am

    #4: Because they say it is. And I believe everything Google says. Don’t you? See Google? I think you’re just the best! Heh heh…

  6. The Phantom Variable says:
    8/6/2011 at 8:12 am

    Well, I hope they ARE tracking ‘my’ usage, because about 12 hours a day I’m running a JavaScript Golem that perfectly imitates human browser usage. I have several of them to choose from: a granny looking for quilting-related stuff, a pervo who searches Google for ‘goats in red latex garter belts’ and ‘pigtailed hookers on tricycles’, and so on.

    Yeah (heh-heh), why don’t you SELL that VALUABLE ‘data’?

  7. Lou says:
    8/6/2011 at 8:41 am

    Use Ixquick for your search needs. Done/Next.

  8. deowll says:
    8/6/2011 at 11:07 am

    #4 I’m sorry to tell you this but your ISP does have that information and Congress wants them to keep it for four years at their cost. In other words big sis wants you to pay for tracking you just in case they want to know more about you.

    You have fun now.

  9. EnemyOfTheState says:
    8/6/2011 at 12:02 pm

    Hell, they may be creating return sets for your searches and storing every bite you send for 10 years. What do you know?

  10. dadeo says:
    8/6/2011 at 3:52 pm

    https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/google-ssl-search/

  11. Red says:
    8/6/2011 at 4:46 pm

    #10 it’s even easier than that

    Just right click in the search field and then left click add to Search Bar.

  12. Dexton7 says:
    8/7/2011 at 1:18 am

    ISP’s really need to quit helping government build their Death Star of Data on all of us. I mean really… What a bunch of A-holes.

    So do we all get a class action check in the mail?
    =D

  13. GregAllen says:
    8/7/2011 at 6:02 am

    Someone needs to tweek the internet so that ISPs can’t know where you are surfing. (or countries, or snoopy IT guys at work)

    I won’t do my usual rant about needing geeks to save us.


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