Stranger Danger: Exploring the Ecosystem of Ad-based URL Shortening Services

@InProceedings{	  nikiforakis_strangerdanger_2014,
  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.},
  author	= {Nikiforakis, Nick and Maggi, Federico and Stringhini,
		  Gianluca and Rafique, M. Zubair and Joosen, Wouter and
		  Kruegel, Christopher and Piessens, Frank and Vigna,
		  Giovanni and Zanero, Stefano},
  booktitle	= {Proceedings of the 23rd International Conference on World
		  Wide Web},
  date		= {2014-04},
  doi		= {10.1145/2566486.2567983},
  file		= {files/papers/conference-papers/nikiforakis_strangerdanger_2014.pdf},
  isbn		= {978-1-4503-2744-2},
  location	= {Seoul, Korea},
  pages		= {51--62},
  publisher	= {International World Wide Web Conferences Steering
		  Committee},
  series	= {WWW '14},
  shorttitle	= {StrangerDanger},
  title		= {Stranger Danger: Exploring the Ecosystem of Ad-based URL
		  Shortening Services},
  url		= {http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2566486.2567983}
}