Paper Info
Title
Stranger danger: exploring the ecosystem of ad-based URL shortening services
Abstract
URL shortening services facilitate the need of exchanging long URLs using limited space, by creating compact URL aliases that redirect users to the original URLs when followed. Some of these services show advertisements (ads) to link-clicking users and pay a commission of their advertising earnings to link-shortening users. In this paper, we investigate the ecosystem of these increasingly popular ad-based URL shortening services. Even though traditional URL shortening services have been thoroughly investigated in previous research, we argue that, due to the monetary incentives and the presence of third-party advertising networks, ad-based URL shortening services and their users are exposed to more hazards than traditional shortening services. By analyzing the services themselves, the advertisers involved, and their users, we uncover a series of issues that are actively exploited by malicious advertisers and endanger the users. Moreover, next to documenting the ongoing abuse, we suggest a series of defense mechanisms that services and users can adopt to protect themselves.
Year
DOI
Venue
2014
10.1145/2566486.2567983
WWW
Keywords
Field
DocType
compact url alias,third-party advertising network,popular ad-based url shortening,ad-based url shortening service,traditional url shortening service,original urls,advertising earnings,stranger danger,long urls,url shortening service,traditional shortening service,advertising,html5,malware
Earnings,World Wide Web,Internet privacy,Commission,HTML5,URL shortening,Incentive,Computer science,Malware
Conference
Citations 
PageRank 
References 
16
0.83
20
Authors
9
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
Nick Nikiforakis186553.35
Federico Maggi252437.68
Gianluca Stringhini370161.87
M. Zubair Rafique422512.44
Wouter Joosen52898287.70
Christopher Kruegel68799516.05
Frank Piessens72455162.28
Giovanni Vigna87121507.72
Stefano Zanero973653.78