TOKYO (MacHouse) – If you are a website owner, you may have a few affiliate links on your website. This article is not about how to increase affiliate revenue. It’s rather about how far you are willing to go for affiliate money. How evil can you become to make money affiliate money?
I ended up at a website whose domain is ixcoupon.com just a couple of hours ago. (See Screenshot 01.) I will tell you how I ended up going to this website in a minute. Anyway, let’s find out what this website is about. Basically, they just want to send you to the website of a web hosting company called IX Web Hosting. If you sign up for a one year of web hosting service or longer, they can make $50, $90 or whatever.
 Screenshot 01 – Source: ixcoupon.com |
 Screenshot 02 – Source: ixcoupon.com |
 Screenshot 03 – Source: ixcoupon.com |
There are three certificate labels at the bottom of the page. The one to the left is a certificate label from McAfee Secure. If it were a genuine certificate, clicking on the label would forward you to McAfree Secure’s website and tell you whose website is exactly certified. But the link behind the Hacker Safe label at the website of ixcoupon.com will not forward you to McAfree Secure’s website. The label is pasted with a hot link directly from McAfree Secure’s certificate page for IX Web Hosting. (See Screenshot 02.) In other words, it’s an illegitimate use of the label. The hyperlink behind this label is process.html. (See Screenshot 02-3.)
And the label to the right comes from TRUSTe (www.truste.org). Similar to Hacker Safe, if you click on TRUSTe’s genuine label, you will be forwarded to TRUSTe’s website where you can see who is certified with their Privacy Seal Program. Nonetheless, the TRUSTe label at the website of ixcoupon.com is illegitimately used. (See Screenshot 04.)
 Screenshot 04 – Source: ixcoupon.com |
 Screenshot 05 – Source: ixcoupon.com |
 Screenshot 06 – Source: IX Web Hosting |
So we now know that the hyperlink behind these two labels will forward you to http://ixcoupon.com/process.html. If you look at the source code of process.html, there is a tag that will redirect you to a different URL. (See Screenshot 05.) And you will be redirected to IX Web Hosting’s website with an affiliate ID. (See Screenshot 06.) So this guy’s affiliate ID is 2940296.
I ended up at the scam website at ixcoupon.com because somebody possibly from this website attempted to post a couple of spam comments. Once in a while, we have idiots visiting our websites trying to post spam comments. With or without reading a warning sign (See Screenshot 07.), they post spam comments to advertise their websites. As for the messenger of IXCoupon.com, he or she wrote
Visit IXCoupon.com to activate exclusive deals and offers for IXWebHosting! (See Screenshot 08.)
Huh!? What are those ‘exclusive deals and offers’?
 Screenshot 07 – Source: seo.mhvt.net |
 Screenshot 08 – Source: seo.mhvt.net |
 Screenshot 09 – Source: Domain Tools |
The IP address of the spammer is shown as 76.2.35.65, whose user can be possibly traced to somewhere near Raleigh, North Carolina, USA. And the domain registration of ixcoupon.com shows that the registrant may come from Waterloo, South Carolina. (See Screenshot 09.) The domain registration doesn’t have to be accurate because ICANN isn’t even run by the government. In that sense, it’s not illegal to submit a fake domain registration. Anyway, it’s possible that this spam comment was posted by the domain registrant of ixcoupon.com, Louis Salerno.
In fact, there appear to be a few victims of vandalism by the same spammer. I visited the website at www.killerstartups.com and found a similar spam comment that advertises IXCoupon.com. (See Screenshot 10.)
 Screenshot 10 – Source: killerstartups.com |
 Screenshot 11 – Source: IX Web Hosting |
 Screenshot 12 – Source: IX Web Hosting |
So what is going to happen to this website? Probably, nothing… What appears to be deceptive at the website of ixcoupon.com may not violate IX Web Hosting’s Affiliate Terms of Service. (See Screenshot 11.) Sending spam messages to advertise the website would violate terms, but not posting spam comments. We actually reported the spam act of the affiliate of IBM-LAPTOP-BATTERIES.COM before. But IX Web Hosting support representative said it was okay. IX Web Hosting closes their eyes on spam vandalism by their clients. That’s why we long support this web hosting company in any way.
Meanwhile, we reported the spam incident involving ixcoupon.com to IX Web Hosting more than 15 hours ago. Their reply?
Can you ask police officer in charge for case investigation to send an fax or regular email with request to terminate the service, we’ll proceed right away. (See Screenshot 12.)
Que? Is this an Indian joke or what? IX Web Hosting outsources their support division to India, by the way.
References:
Allowance of Spam Vandalism and Confirmation by IX Web Hosting
IBM-LAPTOP-BATTERIES.COM and How IX Web Hosting Accepts Spam Vandalism
