February 17th, 2006
Resume: Gold Medalist & Adware Distributor
By Jimmy Daniels
Contributing Writer, RealTechNews
How is that for a resume, gold medalist and adware distributor. Aussie Dale Begg-Smith won the Olympic gold medal in the Men’s Moguls, but, as Wayne Porter put’s it, All that Glitters is not gold, according to StopScum.com he is also distributor of adware through his AdsCPM website. When asked by reporters about his online business, he didn’t want to name the company or the website.
He didn’t want to talk about his internet ad-tracking business and refused even to give the name of the operation.
“I don’t know,” he said, when asked repeatedly to name the business he started when he was 13 with his older brother, Jason, also a moguls skier who didn’t qualify for the final Wednesday.
“It was like, so long ago. I haven’t been doing much on that the last couple years.”
This was noticed when the owner of Geekvillage, Czar, who is also an Aussie, said his name rang a bell, well, it should’ve because he was banned from Geekvillage, and if you do a search for AdsCPM while you are there, you will see some of the complaints, and you can even read some commentary from Dale before he was banned here.
AdsCPM actually ran and hosted http://www3.adscpm.com/FreeMP3Music.exe This exe is loaded with Spyware.
FreeScratchAndWin, hosted on the same server as AdsCPM, also installed lop/rnd and in it’s earlier iteration dealt with xzoomy. It has it’s own parasite designation and eadgbe appears to be correct that it is affiliated with adscpm somehow
Xzoomy.com, also hosted there and which is actively running also has the contact info (Mike Cass) domains@adscpm.com. Xzoomy.com was apparently involved in some auto download via exploit activity (no prompt download).
We Say: Well, there’s a match, he’s easy to find, and it’s easy to track down some of the stuff he’s done to other computer users. What do you all think? Should his country make him return his medal? This is definitely embarrassing to them, I would think, and, even if he did win the gold, I don’t think he should be put on a pedestal by any means.
girlie says:
hey
this is completly ridiculous. I’ve known the guy for like 8 years and even if he has a business involved with spyware/adware, doesn’t make him a bad person. And his gold medal, he won it by himself and it doesn’t have anything to do with the business. He still trained hard and if anything, we should comgratulate him for being able of managing a ski career and a huge business.
and did we ever take the medal away from any competitors in the past for things like that? are we not letting people win medals cuz they are gay and we don’t like it?? are we not letting people win medals cuz they cheat on tour while competing?
for example, we idolize hockey players and they are the worse people in the whole world…what’s worse? making money showing ads or cheating on wife every single week? what makes the hockey player better off in the end? should we be more proud of one of them or what?
February 19th, 2006 at 1:33 pm
Jimmy says:
Making money showing ads? If that’s all it was, there would be no outrage from the online community. I really don’t care whether he gets to keep the medal or not, but I think he should have to give back all the money he made forcing this crap on users pc’s. Defend him all you want, but adware and spyware have made the internet a less fun place to be for lots of people. If the adware and spyware were actually good tools for people, then they wouldn’t need to be forced on to users pc’s.
February 19th, 2006 at 10:27 pm
Jimmy says:
Looks like some of the Australian press has been following the story as well, here is an article from the Sydney Morning Herald called Spyware cybersigns point to Begg-Smith and one from the Australian called Spyware critics question mogul Begg-Smith’s rise.
March 8th, 2006 at 12:31 pm
guy says:
Why is it that before Dale won the olympics this wasnt a relavent topic. This seems to be the norm these days in media. I say shame on you Jimmy for exploting this to profit in your on way. Like stated in the numerous links that you posted Dale as seased the adware and is only designing ad software now, when dale was doing spyware it was not illegal or fround upon, also you speak of it making the web a horrible place. how is a pop under ruining you cyber visit, you dont even see it, and when you do see some reminence it takes less than two seconds to close the box. Stop waisting your time he hasnt done anything wrong.
December 4th, 2007 at 4:25 pm