
Google: A “startpage” filled with ads - z3t4
Remember back in the 90:s when your browser &quot;start page&quot; was your favorite home-page, and that everyone wanted you to have &quot;their&quot; web-page as your start-page!?<p>Why is it now that whatever you type in the browser address bar, you get directed to one of those &quot;start pages&quot; filled with ads?<p>Why can&#x27;t the browser automatically spider the web-pages I visit and take me to the one most relevant to my search? Without showing a bunch of ads and giving away my privacy?<p>I know Firefox, Opera, etc makes 99% of their income from these ad filled start-pages and by selling your privacy. But why do they get away with it?
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schiffern
> _Why is it now that whatever you type in the browser address bar, you get
> directed to one of those "start pages" filled with ads?_

It's not your web browser, it's your ISP. It sounds like your ISP is hijacking
NXDOMAIN to serve ads. If you have Tomato or DD-WRT you can fix this.

[http://hackercodex.com/guide/how-to-stop-isp-dns-server-
hija...](http://hackercodex.com/guide/how-to-stop-isp-dns-server-hijacking/)

If that doesn't fix it, you probably have malware.

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joezydeco
I'm leaning towards malware. Tons of applications install those oh-so-helpful
"toolbars" that clamp into your browser and start hijacking pages and popping
ads under and over your window.

Even the _Java setup program_ tries to install these things now.

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vertex-four
What start page filled with ads? Neither Chrome nor Firefox do this. Chrome's
start page contains either my installed Chrome "apps", or frequently visited
pages. I think Firefox's is just a Firefox-branded version of the Google
search page, but I can't remember and am away from my desktop atm.

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jevgeni
Because no one will work for free on the development side and no one will pay
for search on the consumer side?

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madsravn
> I know Firefox, Opera, etc makes 99% of their income from these ad filled
> start-pages and by selling your privacy. But why do they get away with it?

You can just not use them if you dislike them.

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MalcolmDiggs
My knee-jerk reaction is that adware has infected your machine, particularly
your browser. Or are you saying that the Google SERP is analogous to a start-
page filled with ads?

I'm confused.

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robin_reala
I’m not sure I understand your problem? Or at least I can’t relate it to
anything I’ve seen as a fairly heavy Firefox user.

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aaronem
What's wrong with setting your browser homepage to about:blank? It's worked
fine for me for over a decade.

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amoney
If you're worried about privacy, why not use duckduckgo?

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wnevets
isnt that the "im feeling lucky" feature?

