GenealogyWise is a really dynamic and useful social networking site for genealogists. GenealogyWise is part of FamilyLink which if you keep tracing back through links, is basically Paul Allen and his staff who also run WorldVitalRecords and a lot more. Many of the members post all or part of their own blogs on the GenealogyWise blog posts. Lately, the blog posts coming through Google Reader have been hijacked by spam drug sellers. My Google Reader currently has six posts which appear to be from "Everyone's Blog Posts - Genealogy Wise" but are offers to buy drugs online. The poster in one case is identified as "belkennett3985." Clicking on show original item takes you to the GenealogyWise main page. A Google search on the poster shows that the profile on Genealogy Wise dated from one hour before.
What is happening is that spammers are using GenealogyWise to hijack the blog posting network and use the readers to send out spam to users to of the blog posts. When you follow the links back to GenealogyWise the profile cannot be found, because it is being changed by the spammer to use another profile.
If this continues, I may have to disconnect from reading GenealogyWise just to take control of my Reader account again.
It is annoying isn't it. It probably starts atother places because you allow a person with a blog to put theres out there and then others who closely resemble spam and your not sure if they are legitimate bloggers........ and then wham there they are all the spamers.
ReplyDeleteI have had them steal my address and put spam on it. On those it was the blog I had used for Wiki and a photo from flickr. I had wondered if those people were angry and supplied it to them. However, I had gone back and asked for permission and appologized. No answer from them.I also closed the posting. [hmm I should make sure it is still closed. I should check on more posting addresses. Since many of mine end up being cached.
I joined the bloggers genealogy group and I rarely spend time browsing for all the spam. It makes me boil.
Even at the facebook farmville forums, people misuse it all the time. Grrr.
Where is the ethics conscience in these people