Last week we were the first to report that cable operator Mediacom was using deep packet inspection technology and Javascript injection solutions from Perftech to insert advertisements into websites — including traditionally ad-free sites like Apple.com and Google.com. Despite the fact the story made the rounds to a number of additional websites including the Associated Press, Mediacom has refused to comment publicly on the matter — to us or anybody else. A concerned hosting company informed us they were told by Mediacom the ad injection was a test that failed to get Mediacom legal’s ok before proceeding. Another source this week tells Multichannel News that it was an error, and the ad selling Mediacom phone service was supposed to be a pop up:
Mediacom Communications last month inadvertently injected ads for its phone service into broadband subscribers’ homepages as part of testing a Web-notification technology, according to a source familiar with the project…Mediacom is investigating the tool for potential future uses, such as alerting subscribers of late payments or to notify them that they’re approaching monthly bandwidth-consumption limits if the operator adopts usage-based billing, the source added. The Mediacom ad was supposed to pop up in a new window, according to the source: “They were testing it to see if it worked.” The test was suspended after Mediacom realized the error.
Granted, Mediacom realized the error in part because our users were informed about their connections and started to complain. Mediacom also failed to inform users that the test was ongoing, and still hasn’t made an official comment on the matter likely due to legal concerns.
read comment(s)
