Ed Foster: Belkin Router Redirects Browser to Advertisement

The innocuous box on your network known as the router may not be so innocuous after all. A Belkin wireless router has been found to highjack your browser and redirect you to a page that promotes Belkin's parental control service. Every eight hours an offer for a free six-month trial is delivered to your browser. This is no technical glitch. Belkin openly admits the offer was programmed into the box.

This is highjacking of basic Internet plumbing and is analogous to your toilet barking out a ten second ad every 50th flush. It's unclear whether Belkin's move is qualified as spam but it sure ranks up there with brazen attempts to abuse a customer base.