Addiction wiki spammer
Someone added a new page to my wiki today. The name of the page was “Alcohol Intervention”. The content of the page seemed perfectly reasonable. If it had been on topic, it would have passed superficial inspection. But the link to the page was added first, and it was added many link breaks below the content on another page. So… the method was suspect from the get go.
So, here’s someone who made an effort to write a perfectly reasonable page on alcohol addiction, with some credible links at the bottom, mainly to edu and authority sites. Yes, and the spammer’s own domain at the beginning of the article.
But here are some domains associated with this spammer - he’s got links to several at the bottom of the website he spamvertized on my wiki:
druginterventions.net - 205.234.132.159
drugrehabprogram.net - 72.34.32.176
heroin.org - 205.234.146.222
addictiontreatmentcenter.com - 205.234.140.184
floridadrugrehab.com - 205.234.253.132
helpaddicts.com - 75.126.44.60
drugrehabcenter.com - 66.113.130.222
dual-diagnosis.net - 75.126.44.69
addictionsearch.com - 66.225.219.7
detox-center.com - 75.126.44.71
All of these appear to have an 800 number as a payoff. I couldn’t figure out how that worked, until I found evidence that they have a treatment center. I suppose if you called for a free consultation, you might get a hard sell for coming to the treatment center.
This one appears to be owned by someone else, and has a different payoff, but has links to the same network of websites. Incidentally, the website is owned by someone with the same last name as a therapist employed by the same center as the other websites, and a press release about said therapist is pointing to this site:
enhancedhealing.com - 72.41.61.196
But the main bulk of websites either have whois protection, or the whois tends to point to this guy:
(Whois of two domains removed. The owner of the domains says he got scammed by someone he paid to submit to articles directories. He now says this post comes up as the number one result on Google when searching for his name. If you’re curious, his full name is associated with many of these domains anyway, but let’s just assume he’s learned his lesson, and no need to permanently embarass him)
Another domain associated with Gerald, is kgolf.net. It’s been extensively spamvertized, including one January 2006 sighting, here.
It’s a scraper site with Adsense as payoff. The site is currently owned by Gerald, though I can’t say how long he’s owned it without looking at whois history (anyone?).
And the fact that this is probably a real person, is underscored by this press release:
Drug Rehab Launches New Drug and Alcohol Addiction Talk Show
So, who did the spamming? I don’t know. The IP address is from the Phillipines. 61.9.75.136. Also associated with this spam:61.9.75.189 and the username Shamra.
May 23rd, 2007 at 1:53 pm
That has to be the strangest spam I have seen. The cause is noble enough (sure beats male-impotence issues at least), if it wasn’t a scam to cheat people looking to improve their lives it might almost be positive. It is really low to prey upon those who are truly in need of help and who reach out to what they believe to be, in their desperation, a helping hand.
If the spam is a honest marketer’s attempt to actually help people, then well, they need to re-evaluate their marketing values. If the spam is an attempt to subvert the trust given unto them by the weak in order to profit financially, than I am truly disgusted.
Unfortunately, this does appear to be the second of the two, and I am saddened by that.
May 31st, 2007 at 7:14 am
My name is (name redacted later by moderator at poster’s request) and I just came across your blog regarding the spam on one of your sites.
First of all I want to make it clear that I am not a spammer and we are a real treatment center and we help people everyday. If you call us at the number you will find out. We have been in existence for over 19 years. My father who started the program is a recovering alcoholic with 20 years clean and he started this program. I have been helping out with their website stuff when I can. It seems I made very poor judgment in hiring some individuals/link builders to write content for me and submit to article directories. It seems that they went too far. I apologize for that and just wanted to let you know that the intention was honorable and we really are all about helping people.
I will definitely stay away from this kind of promoting and stick with press releases for getting useful articles out to the public.
June 6th, 2007 at 2:15 pm
That’s nice to hear Jerry. I hope it is not like the alcoholic that says he/she will “never go back to the bottle again”, though , during a period of sobriety.
I wish you good luck.