Follow Slashdot blog updates by subscribing to our blog RSS feed

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
×
Censorship The Internet Hardware Your Rights Online

Belkin To Offer Firmware Fix For Router Hijacking 418

Posted by timothy from the testing-the-waters dept.
L-Train8 writes "Belkin has an announcement at the bottom of their homepage about the spam router. They have decided to disable the 'feature' that hijacks a random http request every 8 hours and redirects to a webpage advertising their parental control system. This will require a firmware upgrade. The message says details will be forthcoming. Interestingly, while I was preparing this submission, the message changed. Originally, it included a snippy remark about how what they were doing was not spam, despite what everyone on the internet says. The new version is much less testy."
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Belkin To Offer Firmware Fix For Router Hijacking More

Belkin To Offer Firmware Fix For Router Hijacking

Comments Filter:

  • "anonymous usage statistics?" (Score:5, Interesting)

    by henc ( 671554 ) * <henc&dtek,chalmers,se> on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:29PM (#7440029) Homepage
    Although they remove this feature, what other 'usage statistics'-logging-features are silently embedded?

    My newer D-Link 604 router has some statistics and a thorough logging function (which is displayed in the web gui). - Is all of it really visible to the end user?

    It's a good bet from the manufacturers that the device will be online all the time.
    Perhaps one should install a box to surveil the router/firewall, if any connections are initiated from the router?

    henc

    • Re:"anonymous usage statistics?" (Score:4, Funny)

      by Davak ( 526912 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:33PM (#7440079) Homepage
      - Installing ads onto a router.
      - Redirecting all non-existant domains to "sitefinder"

      Is this the year for the most stupid marketing ideas on the planet?

    • Re:"anonymous usage statistics?" (Score:4, Interesting)

      by MisanthropicProggram ( 597526 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:42PM (#7440157)
      I hope the folks whose expertise is in this area will keep an eye out for any other hanky-panky.

      I really appreciate the folks who spend the time to figure out these things instead of writing it off as little "quirks" or accepting the line from tech support that you have to get "used to the product".

      My brother actually got this line from a Fujitsu tech support guy when he complained that his laptop didn't always read the CD-rom when a new one was inserted and the fact that the laptop didn't shutdown when told to (It would just restart ). - this was in 1999 - BTW.

    • Re:"anonymous usage statistics?" (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Bowie J. Poag ( 16898 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:42PM (#7440162) Homepage
      No, but your D-Link 604 router is a piece of shit.. I should know, I own one too, unfortunately.

      The router allows Windows XP to bypass normal user/administrator authentication on the router, and add entires to the firewall table.. Have a look at the firewall page on the router, and see if there's two entries for "msmsgs" that you didn't make. Ever wonder how those got there, especially in light of the fact your router is supposed to be password protected? Gee, thanks D-Link!

      Concievably, any schmuck out there could easilly write a virus that pollutes the firewall table in the same manner. I'm surprised nobody has done so already.

      • Re:"anonymous usage statistics?" (Score:5, Informative)

        by Tiersten ( 58773 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:47PM (#7440198)
        Actually, those extra entries are caused by UPNP. It's supposed to automatically add forwarding rules for services running on your local machines.
        The MSN Messenger protocol requires you to listen to certain ports and if you're behind a NAT firewall then it doesn't work properly so it uses UPNP. From what I gather, anything which knows about UPNP can request ports to be opened.

        It's not a specific thing from D-Link. A lot of new routers now support it.

        • Re:"anonymous usage statistics?" (Score:5, Informative)

          by Bowie J. Poag ( 16898 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @10:01PM (#7440315) Homepage
          ..Which is still an exploit.

          Keep in mind, when these "msmsgs" (Which I think is the spam-happy Microsoft Messaging service, not MSN Messenger) entries pop up, they occupy HUGE swathes of IP space. Literally, tens of thousands of ports.

          I originally noticed this problem while playing RTCW. Periodically, I wouldn't be able to log on to any servers, because the goddamn msmsgs entries in the firewall table would encompass the port range where RTCW servers reside (port 27000-30000 or so)... Huge areas of IP space, sometimes >20000 ports wide.

          Did I mention you cant delete these "msmsgs" entries?

          Yup. Not only are they added to the firewall table without your permission, you cant get rid of them. The only way you can remove those entries is by restoring factory defaults and rebooting. It took me 4 or 5 repetitions of this process to figure out what the fuck was going on.

          D-Link, if you're listening, fix your goddamn router.
          • msmsgs is definately MSN Messenger. Windows Messenger is a RPC service I believe.

            It shouldn't register such wide ranges though. Something is either buggy or it's very sloppy programming.

            But yeah, it's not a particularly great thing for security. I've got UPNP disabled on my router and most of the MSN stuff in Trillian works fine. It has issues with me sending files but apart from that it does what I want. In theory somebody out there could write a Back Orifice style program but register the port with
          • So disable the UPNP service on your windows box (or on the router if it supports it).

            My netgear has a checkbox to disable it. That said, I leave it on since it makes it so I can actually transfer files over IM programs. Regular port forwarding works fine unless you have two computers that want to run the same app...

            • RE: UPNP service (Score:3, Informative)

              by King_TJ ( 85913 )
              Right! I always make sure UPNP is disabled on every XP box I set up. I can't really see good reasons for the service to be there - and I recall people complaining about the security holes it created back when it was first released to the public.

              I'm just a little bit surprised routers are actually making use of it now. I guess it's all about pressure put on them to make it easier for people to run special services from multiple computers (since NAT firewalls make you redirect traffic to one specific IP o
        • A lot of new routers support UPnP because it reduces support calls, not because it's a really good idea for a router to support UPnP.

          The disguise of convienience for the home user at the cost of security (which the poor bastard doesn't even know he's giving up)to save the manufacturer the expense and pain in the ass of telling him how to properly configure the device.

          The fact that it allows devices and apps to open their own outgoing doors without asking permission is just icing on the cake for the manufa

        • The MSN Messenger protocol requires you to listen to certain ports and if you're behind a NAT firewall then it doesn't work properly so it uses UPNP. From what I gather, anything which knows about UPNP can request ports to be opened.

          Umm... no. The MSN Messenger protocol does not require you to listen to certain ports and works just fine from behind a NAT firewall which has no open ports and does not support UPNP at all. It also works just fine when running on a system with UPNP completely removed. Where

      • That my friend, is UPnP, Universal Plug and Play.

        Any device that speaks UPnP (most commonly, system services) can talk to a UPnP-complaint router, and have port forwarding automatically opened for it.

        This is good for a lot of stuff...takes the guesswork out of port forwarding for apps that support it.

        It's not neferious at all.

      • Yet another reason to take an old PC (or a new mini-ITX box), throw in a 2nd NIC, and roll your own firewall/router/NAT box/etc. Sometimes plug-n-play is not a good thing.

      • Turn off UPnP. (Score:3, Informative)

        by Trillan ( 597339 )

        It's on Tools->Misc.

      • I have a D-Link 604 and I don't see what you're talking about. What page of the config thingie is it on? Advanced->Virtual Server? Advanced->Applications? I don't see it anywhere. When I got mine I went through a little process of wiping out all of their cute defaults and just putting in what I needed. It has served me well, can't say I have any complaints at all. (Other than their config webpage thing being ugly as hell.)

  • I've got a fix... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Dimensio ( 311070 ) <darkstar@LISPiglou.com minus language> on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:29PM (#7440032)
    ...It involves a hatchet.

    Seriously, Belkin's response to this has been utterly abysmal. First they tried to justify it, only now that it's blowing up in their face do they try to remedy it.

    They've lost a great deal of trust that they will never regain.

    • Re:I've got a fix... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Davak ( 526912 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:38PM (#7440124) Homepage
      Honestly, this is the most stupid thing since TurboTax decided to write to the boot sector. [slashdot.org]

      Will anybody affected ever buy TurboTax Again?
      You think anybody will buy Belkin after this act of stupidity?

      These companies just need a couple dozen average slashdot-type geeks to filter their ideas through. We would weed a lot of this stupid crap out. Hell, they could have just posted the idea in the newsgroup and watched the flames pour in.

      Somebody will get fired over this...

      Davak

    • Re:I've got a fix... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Shakrai ( 717556 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:43PM (#7440168) Journal
      They've lost a great deal of trust that they will never regain.

      Sure, among uber-geeks and /.'ers. John Q. Public who purchased these Routers was doubtless annoyed by it, but John Q. Public who is still in the market and who (likely) hasn't heard about it will still consider buying Belken products.

      Two questions/points would spring to mind:

      1) I pity the poor Level 1 techs at Belken who are going to have to walk all the Mom & Pop users through flashing the firmware.
      2) I wonder how many units are still sitting on store shelves with the old firmware in them? This could haunt Belken for quite some time yet.

      Personally, I have experience with Linksys, Belken and Netgear NAT routers. I'll be sticking with my Duron based $250 Linux box and iptables :) So what if it uses 50+ kilowatt hours of power a month ;)

      • I hope they show a link to this firmware update page on their "Try our super parental control!" page.

        Oh well, people who buy wireless routers should be savvy enough to be able to figure out what's going on.
      • 1) I pity the poor Level 1 techs at Belken who are going to have to walk all the Mom & Pop users through flashing the firmware.

        To flash the firmware on most routers, you just login to some web interface and click the "update firmware" option.

        • Re:I've got a fix... (Score:4, Insightful)

          by Shakrai ( 717556 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:56PM (#7440275) Journal
          To flash the firmware on most routers, you just login to some web interface and click the "update firmware" option.

          What's a web interface? How do I login? Where do I type in that address? What's number lock? Do I need to plug the router in first? If I unplugged the router by accident in the middle of the upgrade am I in trouble?

          Sorry, again, "I pity the poor Level 1 techs at Belken who are going to have to walk all the Mom & Pop users through flashing the firmware".

          (And yes before I'm modded flamebait that was the disgruntled ramblings of a former Level 1 support tech ;)

          • Err, I get your point, but really... "what's a web interface?". Why would they be buying a router if they don't know what the web is?

            • Re:I've got a fix... (Score:5, Funny)

              by Shakrai ( 717556 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @10:04PM (#7440340) Journal
              Err, I get your point, but really... "what's a web interface?". Why would they be buying a router if they don't know what the web is?

              The web? Isn't that like AOL?

              Sorry, that was too easy. I should probably lose some of my cynicism :P It's been reinforced too much by end users.

              In all seriousness though, I think "web interface" would confuse them, whereas if you said "We are going to a special webpage in Internet Explorer" or something along those lines you'd have better luck. Or maybe not. Never underestimate the stupidity of an end-user....

          • If you can't walk someone through typing http://myrouter in their address bar and clicking the "install updates" option, you probably weren't a very good support tech.

            • Re:I've got a fix... (Score:3, Interesting)

              by Shakrai ( 717556 )
              If you can't walk someone through typing http://myrouter in their address bar and clicking the "install updates" option, you probably weren't a very good support tech.

              You entirely missed the point of my original comment, which was "I pity the poor Level 1....." Just because you can do it, doesn't mean you want to. Give me 5 or 10 minutes I can walk just about anybody through doing anything. That doesn't mean I enjoy doing so.

              My point being, that the Belken tech support ppl (or whoever they outsource it

              • Re:I've got a fix... (Score:3, Insightful)

                by racermd ( 314140 )
                True, most level-1 techs are good at what they do, and they typically don't enjoy it too much. In fact, it's all they (we) can do to keep from saying, "Take this job and shove it."

                And I don't think that 5-10 minutes of tech support will work for a large number of people. Don't believe me? Read some of the stories at Tech Support Comedy [techcomedy.com]. Every time I feel bad that I've got to deal with some of the dumbest people on the planet, I just read some of the stories on this site. I suddenly feel much better an
    • >> Seriously, Belkin's response to this has been
      >> utterly abysmal

      There response was fine, but this issue is WAY over-hyped. While you see this every 8 hours, that only happens if you don't click the 'don't show this again' option. Then it's gone forever. This issue has been way over-hyped and it is a non-issue. They offered you a product/service, you decline it, and you never see it again. There are MUCH WORSE WAYS THEY COULD HAVE GONE ABOUT THIS.

      Here is a snippet from usenet [google.com] with Belkin
        • but this issue is WAY over-hyped.

        Wrong. When a precedent is set it is always a huge deal; hijaaking HTTP requests for company-sponsored oh-yeah-I-guess-it-could-be-seen-as-an-ad spam breaks new ground. Lookit, people still cheer Chuck Yeager for breaking the sound barrier, Hank Aaron for his home runs, Armstrong for his one small step and we still jeer Robert Morris Jr.'s first Internet Worm, Amazon's One-Click patent, X10's pop-under ads (not the actual first, but many people's first in experience). Cl

  • I would hide from those Microsoft appointed CyberBountyHunters.

    Bad boys, bad boys, what ya gonna do
    when Billy Gates starts using his money on you

  • In case their message changes again... (Score:3, Informative)

    by Evil Adrian ( 253301 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:30PM (#7440047) Homepage
    "Important message from Belkin:
    We at Belkin apologize for the recent trouble our customers have experienced with the wireless router/browser redirect issue. We will be offering firmware fixes available for download early next week. We do not have exact details yet but we can tell you now that each Router's firmware that incorporates Parental Control as an option will be changed.

    Please expect more detailed information to follow early next week. Thank you."

    If anyone has the testy version, post that too! I'm curious.
    • From the google cache [google.com]

      "Belkin is aware of some recent postings that claim that Belkin wireless routers are spamming users during the setup process and periodically thereafter. It is not now, nor has it ever been, the policy of Belkin to intentionally spam our customers or anyone else. Belkin offers a free trial of our parental control feature in our routers, and to make our customers aware of the feature itself and to give them the opportunity to take advantage of the free trial, we have tried to direct users to the information regarding the parental control features. However, since this has become a source of concern to our users, and it is Belkin policy to address the concerns of our users quickly, Belkin has decided to remove this function from the routers. Each router's firmware that incorporates parental control as an option will be changed.

      Please expect more detailed information to follow early next week. Thank you."

  • Original Snippy Message (Score:5, Informative)

    by tribes ( 613022 ) * on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:31PM (#7440052)
    Go go, Google cache [216.239.53.104]!

    Kharma whoring for fun and profit....

  • The old message? from Google cache (Score:5, Informative)

    by AEton ( 654737 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:32PM (#7440068)

    cache here [216.239.37.104] (as of 10 Nov 2003 20:43 EST):

    Belkin is aware of some recent postings that claim that Belkin wireless routers are spamming users during the setup process and periodically thereafter. It is not now, nor has it ever been, the policy of Belkin to intentionally spam our customers or anyone else. Belkin offers a free trial of our parental control feature in our routers, and to make our customers aware of the feature itself and to give them the opportunity to take advantage of the free trial, we have tried to direct users to the information regarding the parental control features. However, since this has become a source of concern to our users, and it is Belkin policy to address the concerns of our users quickly, Belkin has decided to remove this function from the routers. Each router's firmware that incorporates parental control as an option will be changed.

    • Re:The old message? from Google cache (Score:5, Interesting)

      by _Sprocket_ ( 42527 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @01:44AM (#7441653)
      Here's some more interesting things for the record.

      The origional reply from Eric Deming ("a product manager for Belkin's LAN products and ... very involved with the development of the Parental Control feature") to news.admin.net-abuse.email was removed. Oddly enough. However you can find mirrored copies re-inserted in to Google Groups thanks to:

      Malev [google.com]
      Clifton T. Sharp Jr. [google.com]
      dave [google.com]

      And even a simple text mirror outside Google's domain provided by Steven J Sobol [stevesobol.com].

      The removed message was replaced by a very familiar sounding post again from Eric Deming. Google Groups currently has its own copy available [google.com] (at the time of this writing). But others have already began the process of burying [google.com] the text - probably due to previous experience.

      Of course - if all these sources fail you... you can always find the same text burried in reader comments from the initial Slashdot article mentioned in this article's submission.
  • Half the time I don't risk upgrading the firmware on my devices cuz I don't trust the engineers didn't mess something up (and they're always labeled beta... but I give up...)... How the hell am I supposed to trust they won't implement some other backdoor feature in their firmware?

    They've gone so far as to generate traffic to their homepage to advertise crap, what's keeping them from simply redirecting your Outgoing data to some IP address on their networks, for anonymous data collection or some other BS, w
    • Updating firmware isn't as scary as you make it out to be. I've updated firmware on a large number of devices on the PCs I've owned or serviced, and never have I been screwed by it. Just read the instructions and follow them carefully, and make sure you understand what they are telling you to do so that you can be sure you're really doing it properly. It's really not that bad.
      • The OP probably knows how to update the FW. He's wondering about what new backdoors/advertising/whatever Belkin has put in...
        • I don't figure it's any more likely that there are backdoors in a new version than in the original version. Combine that with the bug fixes they put in and I'd say it's usually safer to upgrade...

  • original message text (Score:5, Informative)

    by L-Train8 ( 70991 ) <Matthew_Hawk AT hotmail DOT com> on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:33PM (#7440077) Homepage Journal
    I was in the process of cutting and pasting Belkin's message into a story submission earlier today when it changed, so I have the original text. The message earlier today read:

    Belkin is aware of some recent postings that claim that Belkin wireless routers are spamming users during the setup process and periodically thereafter. It is not now, nor has it ever been, the policy of Belkin to intentionally spam our customers or anyone else. Belkin offers a free trial of our parental control feature in our routers, and to make our customers aware of the feature itself and to give them the opportunity to take advantage of the free trial, we have tried to direct users to the information regarding the parental control features. However, since this has become a source of concern to our users, and it is Belkin policy to address the concerns of our users quickly, Belkin has decided to remove this function from the routers. Each router's firmware that incorporates parental control as an option will be changed.

    Please expect more detailed information to follow early next week. Thank you.

    Now we have the more concise and concilliatory

    We at Belkin apologize for the recent trouble our customers have experienced with the wireless router/browser redirect issue. We will be offering firmware fixes available for download early next week. We do not have exact details yet
    but we can tell you now that each Router's firmware that incorporates Parental Control as an option will be changed.

    Please expect more detailed information to follow early next week. Thank you.

    • The marketeers are being shown the door by the PR people, the latter having been educated by engineering, and the former being uneducable.
    • Maybe I am just too accepting, but that message does not seem "snippy" to me. Maybe a little long-winded, but hardly condescending.

      • Re:original message text (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Drishmung ( 458368 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @10:19PM (#7440454)
        It's a very common attitude: that spam is something that other people do. Our advertising is valuable and desirable and can't possibly be spam, so different rules apply.

        It is really, really basic. It's a form of the Golden Rule. "Would this be acceptable to us if someone did it to us?" Or, "would our customers find this acceptable if another company did it?"

        The marketing types responsible for this are demonstrably liabilities to Belkin and should be dismissed. As if...

    • Re:original message text (Score:5, Funny)

      by Humba ( 112745 ) * on Monday November 10, 2003 @10:33PM (#7440548)
      We apologise for the fault in the router. Those responsible have been sacked.

      Mynd you, moose bites Kan be pretty nasti...

      We apologise again for the fault in the router. Those responsible for sacking the people who have just been sacked have been sacked.

      --Humba
    • Wow, I just read the page and read yet a third variant on this text. Here's what I saw.

      Important message from Belkin:

      In response to a recent Usenet group posting stating that Belkin spams its customers through its routers, Belkin Corporation apologizes for the concern this has caused and is taking action to address the issue. To allay customers' worries, Belkin will offer a firmware upgrade that will be available via download from its website (www.belkin.com) on November 17, 2003. This upgrade will rid

  • I am such a Karma Whore (Score:3, Informative)

    by Evil Adrian ( 253301 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:33PM (#7440078) Homepage
    Here's an article [com.com] about it from about 7 hrs ago.

    Here's an article about their stupid response [dslreports.com].

    Here's the original Slashdot article [slashdot.org].
  • So now we can pay for them to track our activities and send us advertisement. Reminds me of how initially having a logo on an article of clothing seamed insane... now we are walking billboards.

    • Re:Adware.. but what else (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Reminds me of how initially having a logo on an article of clothing seamed insane

      pa-dum chshhh!!! :)

  • Speaking of routers... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by toupsie ( 88295 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:33PM (#7440081) Homepage
    I am in the market for a small home DSL router and now that Belkin is completely out of the running, what would you choose? I would love one with SNMP monitoring. I currently have an old LinkSys 4 port-er. 802.11g would be nice to have on it. Any suggestions?
    • I'm typing this right now on my laptop connected over 802.11g to my cable line through my linksys WRT54g [linksys.com]. It seems to be what your looking for, 4 port switch and Wi-Fi, it was relativly cheap and easy to setup, range is better than expected and the speed is decent. I definitly recomend linksys, all my networking stuff besides the NIC in my main box(onboard anyway) and my cable modem (motorola surfboard provided by time warner) are linksys and i havn't had any problems with any of it.


  • "Feature"?... Dear lord. There must be some really, really fine crack going around in industry circles these days. Belkin sounds like they've taken a hit or two off the SCO crack pipe.

    I wonder if they use their own products in-house. That would be a fitting punishment if it ever came down to a class-action suit.... Force Belkin to use their own products. :)

  • lemme guess... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:34PM (#7440094)
    Every 8 hours you get redirected to a page saying "Sorry, we won't do it again. Promise."
  • Forget it. I'm not using a Belkin product unless they can prove there's no hidden "features" in the firmware. Either they open their source code, or they pay an independent review agency to completely review the firmware, hardware, etc. Every single chip in that router should be examined for any hidden "features". This was a monumental clusterfuck. And now you tell me they actually had the stupidity to attempt to defend their actions? Morons.

    Anyone want to do some testing on the new firmware to make sure i
    • shouldn't be impossible to test.

      put the router inside a firewall... something that creates a pop up window every time the router goes out for resources on the WAN side.. Hell, put it on a PC with two ethernet ports, one to your broadband connection, one to the router, and then bridge the connection. A firewall on the PC, or logger, should tell you every time the 'router' goes anywhere, and 'where' that it is trying to go to....

    • Screw that, I'm not buying another Belkin product, period. I don't care if it's just a cable. I've got a couple hundred bucks worth of their cables, but I'm done giving money to them.

      Unfortunately, their cables are about all that the big box stores carry for some types of cables, like firewire and VGA/serial, etc.

  • Brouhaha over nothing (Score:3, Interesting)

    by fleener ( 140714 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:39PM (#7440135)
    I have a Belkin for my home. Upon setting up the equipment, the advert page was the first one I saw. I skipped it, but encountered it again about a (?) week later. That time I actually read it and realized I had to jump through a hoop to never see the page again. I can't imagine managing a computer lab and taking more than a day to notice the advert.

    Yes, I was annoyed, but no more than from mandatory product registrations or e-mails I receive from e-tailers from whom I've bought something. In the grand scheme of things, I'm used to the abuse. Today's standard practice is to let the customer opt-out after the first annoying sales pitch.

    I honestly was surprised to see this issue posted on /. as a discussion topic. I accept it as the way companies act today, nothing unusual.

    • Re:Brouhaha over nothing (Score:5, Insightful)

      by herrvinny ( 698679 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:48PM (#7440211)
      The problem is, you do accept it so willingly. You shouldn't have to deal with this. Nobody should have to.

      Advertising shouldn't be on a product that is paid for. The router should do only one thing: route packets. Anything else, if it drops packets, rewrites packets (which it does), etc, then it doesn't work properly, and a complaint to Belkin is in order, along with a request for an RMA#. If the router is designed not to work properly (as it seems), then we need to file a report with the FTC.
      • >The problem is, you do accept it so willingly.
        > You shouldn't have to deal with this. Nobody
        > should have to.

        And yet that's the evil world we live in. I never vote democrat or republican so as to not prolong our torture, that's an easy choice. But with products there's no way to tell which corporation will annoy me until after I've bought and used the product. I've never seen a "crap free" sticker on any product.

    • That's the tradgedy (Score:4, Insightful)

      by L-Train8 ( 70991 ) <Matthew_Hawk AT hotmail DOT com> on Monday November 10, 2003 @10:13PM (#7440397) Homepage Journal
      I accept it as the way companies act today, nothing unusual.

      This is what is really bad, and why Belkin thought they could get away with this crap. We have become used to the abuse. We need to stand up and say, "I'm mad as hell, and I'm not gonna take it anymore!"

      The incredibly onerous and annoying contracts that have become standard parts of software licenses are starting to creep out of the fine print of click-through EULA's that no one ever reads and into everyday life. I think hardware companies look enviously at software companies, with their "no responsiblity for the company/no rights for the user" legal disclaimers. They are increasingly trying to get the same kind of weasely deals for themselves.

      But actual physical products are a different animal, and you can't hide how you're screwing the customer behind an "agree" button. If EULA's weren't such confusing legalese, and people actually bothered to understand what they are actually "agreeing" to, I believe we'd all make a bigger stink about it. Fortunately, it's more obvious when physical items try to act like virtual ones.
      • >We need to stand up and say, "I'm mad as hell,
        > and I'm not gonna take it anymore!"

        That's nice sentiment, but not practical in the real world. I'm mad as hell with Microsoft, but am locked into using Windows (don't even try to say Linux is ready for general consumer use). I'm mad as hell with the MPAA, but I still watch movies because indy movies are hard to find and most suck. The only thing that slogan works for me with is the RIAA. I only buy music direct from the artist now, purely local bands
    • I can't imagine managing a computer lab and taking more than a day to notice the advert.

      How come? If the router is being used by a lot of people (in a lab environment), and the page only comes up once randomly every 8 hours, chances are, they'll only show up at a random user's workstation, who'd just click it away. And the admin wouldn't realize what's going on.
      • Well, I expect you'd notice the page because the advert is the first web page you see after install. And if you're dealing with more than one lab, you'd catch on pretty quick.
    • You know, this reminds me of DVDs. I don't see people up in arms that DVDs have mandatory FBI warnings, copyright warnings, corporate logo intros and disclaimers that are forced upon the home viewer each and every time a DVD is played. In the case of the logo, it's a clear case of hijacking my DVD player to show me a corporate advertisement.
  • "We do not have exact details yet but we can tell you now that each Router's firmware that incorporates Parental Control as an option will be changed."

    Hmm.. hopefully this doesn't mean they're going to do something even more nefarious, like only hijack sessions going to the websites of parental control software manufacturers...

    I look forward to seeing how they wind up handling the fix, and what they have to say about the patch when it's released. Hopefully Belkin has learned that this was an incredibly ba

  • Userfriendly cartoon bashing... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Kentamanos ( 320208 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:43PM (#7440165)
    Sorry if everyone's seen it already, just saw someone post it on another messageboard I read.

    UserFriendly ad [userfriendly.org]

  • The damage is done (Score:4, Insightful)

    by bnavarro ( 172692 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:45PM (#7440179)
    I use an old Pentium computer as a Linux router for my cable modem; I was an early adopter of broadband, before these router devices were affordable.

    I had considered switching over to one of these devices (I have periodic problems with the hard disk failing, and I am running out of small hard disk replacements for it :-( ), but after seeing this little stunt, no way. I won't trust any router that I can't program myself now. When my Packard Hell quits, I'm gonna just buy another old used computer and turn it into a Linux router.

    I would strongly urge anyone else savvy with Linux or even *BSD administration to strongly consider this route. Belkin just proved that you can't trust anyone to route your data with a "black box" solution. OK, maybe not Cisco, but are you gonna fork over $10k for a home router? ;-)

    (Yes I know Cisco just bought Linksys; I still won't trust 'em)
    • i use an old pentium too.. (underclocked 200mmx).

      but the reason i use it is because the 'hard'ware nats that would be able to push reasonable amounts of data through cost shitloads of money(that is, even if they have '100mbit' for the outside connection, which they rarely even have, it can't really push more than 1-2mbyte/s through, where the old pentium with dlink&intel cards can push 6-7mbyte/s at best, before the cheapo dlink card it had a realtek based cheapo card that was much worse, only 3mbyte/
  • Now they just need to do a press release naming the marketer that thought it up, saying that he was fired for cause. :)

  • It's a quality thing (Score:4, Insightful)

    by WolfWithoutAClause ( 162946 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:46PM (#7440196) Homepage
    The bottom line of this is that this feature was good for the producer, and bad for the customer (potentially very bad if it messes up something on an intranet).

    Trouble is, we buy products because it is good for us, not good for the manufacturer. They seem to have lost sight of it, although may have realised their mistake (or equally likely they haven't realised it, but it's just they dislike the bad publicity).

    Either way, it speaks volumes of their corporate decision making. In my experience, corporate decision making is at best, of highly variable quality; managers try to come up with just slightly too clever schemes that try to raise profits at the (non financial) expense of the customer. These things add negative qualities to the product. Why would you ever want to do that?

  • Actually, that was the first message (Score:3, Informative)

    by FearUncertaintyDoubt ( 578295 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:47PM (#7440199)
    The message that is currently running on their web site was actually what they originally posted on their site on Friday night, when they started to realize the uproar that they had provoked (and posted this message to the usenet [slashdot.org]).

    Then, either Saturday or Sunday, they changed it to the far less likable one, which was much closer to Eric Deming's original reply in the usenet thread (which, oddly enough, was deleted from google groups). The problem is that it seemed more that they were trying to spin than acknowledge the problem. Methinks that they went back to the first version because they realized that they couldn't spin it at all.

  • Too little, too late (Score:5, Insightful)

    by swordgeek ( 112599 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:51PM (#7440235) Journal
    Belkin has lost my business, until they very aggressively do something to FIX the problems of the internet.

    All that backing off here is doing, is admitting that they pushed a bit too hard. Nobody can tell me that the goal of Belkin has changed, or is any different from VeriSign's. They want to manipulate the infrastructure of the internet. They want control over my computer, and how it works.

    Fuck 'em. They have to REALLY work hard to win back my business. Apologizing and issuing a firmware patch ain't good enough by half.

  • Canned email reply from Belkin (Score:3, Informative)

    by PHPee ( 559830 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:58PM (#7440294) Homepage
    Like many fellow Slashdotters, I emailed several different people/departments at Belkin, expressing my disappointment with their new "feature". I received the following canned response today, from Eric Pipkin, an Account Manager at Belkin:
    Rob,


    Please refer to attachment below in regards to your email.

    Thnx.
    The email contained a 119k pdf file attachment, which I actually found on the Belkin website by adding the filename to the end of the belkin.com URL. Here's a link to the pdf file I received: http://www.belkin.com/Belkin_parental-control.pdf [belkin.com]

    It doesn't really tell us anything new, except that Belkin seems to be missing the point entirely, defending their "feature" and not mentioning anything about any upcoming firmware fixes.

  • Can I bill Belkin for field installation? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by G4from128k ( 686170 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @09:59PM (#7440298)
    Corporate behavior like this drives me insane. The personal labor cost to fix their defective product exceeds the price of the product. But I'm sure the EULA is careful to explain that the product is not necessarily useful for anything and Belkin is liable for nothing beyond the price of the product.
  • if you sell a widget to do thing x, just have it do that thing. don't collect stats. don't have it usually do thing x buf sometimes do thing y randomly.

    even with this change the chances of me buying anything by belkin ever again are nil. until i see belkin publicly appoint an ethics officer who will vet marketing decisions like this (and with the power to block them) i will actively encourage people to avoid them as well.

    i suspect i'm not alone in this opinion.

  • Comment removed (Score:3)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @10:02PM (#7440324)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Re:not buying Belkin (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Shakrai ( 717556 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @10:15PM (#7440419) Journal
      The sooner hardware manufacturers realize that pulling stunts like this results in some sort of backlash which affects their bottom line, the better.

      Hey, not to rise to Belken's defense (because I'm not too hip on their products.... got a dead USB hub from them once... and a dead USB add-on card a week later, both RMA'ed and replaced thou, but still...), but does anybody seriously think this was an intentional stunt?

      More likely then not, this was the brainchild of some idiot in marketing, who will probably lose his job over it. One of those ideas that looks great on paper and blows up in your face when released to the world. It's happened to all of us at one point or another (though probably not to this scale).

      Now that doesn't excuse the initial statement on the website defending the feature. But again, that was probably the brainchild of some idiot in PR saying "We can't admit we made a mistake". Fortunately, it seems that smarter heads prevailed in this case.

  • So now the real question...

    What is the punishment lifecycle for this kind of abbuse? They fixed it pretty fast but it burned a hole in their credibility out here in user land.

    How fast do we forgive? Do we forgive at all? How many releases will receive strict scruteny before Belkin regains "acceptable vendor" status? Are we now intent on scrubbing all their products for any exploit on the "fool me once" principle?

    Quite a quandary.

  • Revised Email Sig (Score:3, Informative)

    by Bob9113 ( 14996 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @11:03PM (#7440757) Homepage
    Following is my revised email sig, part of which is stolen from a +5 rated message from the last story. Keep the pressure on folks. As Microsoft has so clearly demonstrated, preventing further harm from one specific act is not enough to dissuade new and more creative despicable acts by malicious corporations. Companies must realized that it is not enough to say you're sorry (particularly when you have your fingers crossed behind your back). We don't let criminals who have malice aforethought get away with "I'm Sorry". We should not be any more lenient with malicious corporations.

    Belkin (verb) - To surreptitiously alter a product in such a fashion that legitimate use is hijacked to the benefit of the manufacturer or associated beneficiaries, usually in a crass self-promoting fashion.
    "I installed topdesk and it belkined my browser."
    "VeriSign's SiteFinder belkined the .com and .net TLDs."

    Belkin products are broken as designed. http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/11/07/174020 5

    Belkin has recanted and claims they will issue a patch. Good. Now all they have to do for me to remove this .sig is to pay their pennance. Backing down is not enough, I require satisfaction. May I suggest a $100,000 donation to the EFF?

  • Buh Bye Belkin (Score:3, Interesting)

    by FunWithHeadlines ( 644929 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @11:40PM (#7441008) Homepage
    Later for you, Belkin. I want nothing to do with a company that treats its customers with contempt. You fixed the problem, you say? Why did you create a problem in the first place, and who is to say there isn't something else in there still hidden? You didn't do a thing about this problem until it blew up in your face. So you aren't sorry, you are sorry you got caught.

    Why is it whenever a company that thinks of itself as reputable sends spam (unasked for advertising messages) to someone they deny it is spam? 'We did not spam our users. We had a product we thought they would be interested in so we directed their attention to the product.' In other words, you spammed. Busted by your own admission.

    I've used Belkin products in the past. Never again. Trust shattered. Blame the marketing person at your company who came up with this idea.

  • Spam? Nah! Broken? You bet! (Score:3, Interesting)

    by rnturn ( 11092 ) on Monday November 10, 2003 @11:41PM (#7441013)

    ``Originally, it included a snippy remark about how what they were doing was not spam, despite what everyone on the internet says.

    And, AFAICT, they're correct. It wasn't really spam and ``everyone on the internet'' that called it that were wrong. What everyone on the internet should have called it is ``a broken router'' which should have been recalled or replaced free of charge. Gosh, isn't nice of them to offer a firmware fix. What happens when the fix isn't applied properly by the end-users? Well they're pretty much screwed as far as their internet access now aren't they? Belkin should do the right thing and ship everyone using one of these broken units a brand new router that properly routes.

    Almost makes you wish for a certification process for any equipment that's connected to a public network. If it doesn't strictly adhere to IETF standards, it doesn't get connected. Just out of curiosity, what RFC specifies the manner by which a router is supposed to replace requests with preferred advertisers? Oh yah. The same one Verisign referred to when designing their SiteFinder atrocity.

  • All Your Requests Are Belong To Us (Score:3, Funny)

    by denks ( 717389 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @02:07AM (#7441760) Journal
    In AD 2003
    War was beginning
    Manager: What happen?
    Sys Admin: Somebody set us up the router
    User: We get page
    Manager: What!
    User: Main Monitor Turn On
    Manager: Its you!
    Belkin: How are you gentlemen?
    Belkin: All your requests are belong to us
    Belkin: You are on the way to destruction
    Manager: What you say!!
    Belkin: You have no chance to survive make your backup
    Belkin: HA HA HA HA...
    User: Boss!!
    Manager: Take off every 'port'!!
    Manager: You know what you doing
    Manager: Move port
    Manager: For great justice

  • What about the backdoor? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Pepebuho ( 167300 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @03:24AM (#7442049)
    The Belkin router had not only a non compliant routing algorithm, but it had also a backdoor. Remember, if you clicked on "No Thanks", then a flag INSIDE THE ROUTER would be modified to disallow the misbehavior. Namely CLICKING AN EXTERNAL WEBPAGE MODIFIED THE INSIDES OF YOUR ROUTER!!!!! Is Belkin fixing this security hole also?

  • Listen to the Engineers, not Marketing (Score:3, Interesting)

    by sir_cello ( 634395 ) on Tuesday November 11, 2003 @05:53AM (#7442470)

    Take a straw poll of Belkin Engineers, and you'll probably find that most of them also think that this was a stupid idea. I'm sure its a Marketing decision - no real Engineer I know would sanction such a thing. I know that where I work we've had to do stupid things to keep Marketing happy - and it's always enjoyable when the shit comes back to hit the fan and Marketing takes it in face. This kind of Engineering sport is enjoyable :-).

    The other good thing is this: now that it's been so embarrasing for Belkin, we can be reasonably confident that no one else will repeat the idea. Any marketing person who wants to keep their job will make sure of this: delivering and supporting firmware upgrades is not cheap, nor is the loss of goodwill for your product.

    Does anyone have time to tell whether any other Belkin products have similar bozo-features ? Or, can we watch Belkin in the next month or two to see whether any other firmware upgrades are released ?

  • Instant poll:

    Who smoked the most crack in 2003?

    (_) SCO
    (_) Belkin
    (_) Verisign
    (_) CowboyNeal
    (_) *A
    (_) All of the above

Slashdot Top Deals

I tell them to turn to the study of mathematics, for it is only there that they might escape the lusts of the flesh. -- Thomas Mann, "The Magic Mountain"

Close