Find His Porn: Evil Website of the Week

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/find_his_porn_evil_website_of_the_week.php

by jzb • 15 years ago

98 110 15 years ago

readwriteweb.com

Jgrubb• 15 years ago

Well this is sure to put a stop to guys watching porn when their women aren't looking.

jzb3• 15 years ago

Well, as long as they're on Windows, anyway...

jzb3• 15 years ago

I think this comment was widely misinterpreted. The product only runs on Windows. That was the point.

loire280• 15 years ago

$20 for a one-time scan? Assuming their SEO is as honest as their business model, this site must print money.

jonmwords3• 15 years ago

Totally. With that name, they probably don't have much SEO work to do at all.

slig3• 15 years ago

Fuck SEO. With a tool that does exactly and trivially what the costumer is looking for and appeals to a target niche so perfectly, and $20 a pop, I bet they can pay to be the top ad.

Tobu3• 15 years ago

The point was, snarfing $20 every time someone feels insecure is not an honest business model.

mxavier• 15 years ago

This service may serve a purpose for men as an early indicator that their SO has communication issues. I cannot speak for anyone else but I for one would not want to be in a relationship where my SO was spying on me like she was my probation officer.

thomasgerbe• 15 years ago

Not to mention is watching porn while in a relationship that big of a deal?

codabrink• 15 years ago

It depends on what kind of relationship you have. Traditionally, and what seems right to most people is a relationship with a level of commitment towards the other. I'm not saying this is always true, but that level of commitment does have benefits, usually resulting in a stronger relationship because of the trust developed.

sixtofour• 15 years ago

It is to some, and it's not to others, and either attitude is fine if mutually agreed to. Spying and control is a big deal.

bethling• 15 years ago

It is to some people - I know I'd be bothered by it. Mostly due to my own insecurities. I'd wonder "Why?", and wonder what I'm not doing that he wants.

For some it might been seen as a light form of cheating.

I think that it's a sensitive enough topic that if you're doing it without your partner knowing that you're likely treading into a potential problem.

(For the record, I feel like searching your partner's computer for anything is a gross violation of trust - more so than watching porn without the other person knowing)

someinternetguy• 15 years ago

Opportunity rises for a new product. The findhispornfinder, that checks if someone has run the product from findhisporn.com on your computer.

slig3• 15 years ago

RWW is linking to that site without a rel="nofollow".

No such thing as bad PR, eh?

jonmwords3• 15 years ago

OOH. Good point. I'll update the post.

solutionyogi• 15 years ago

It feels like this guys' read Patio's blog and decided to create a product which appeals to women. I would love to know the kind of money these guys are making.

VMG• 15 years ago

This is also what I took from the story. The title should be "Business Idea Of The Week".

I admit that the service is morally questionable, but the simplicity and execution is intriguing. There have to be similarly trivial ideas that can be turned into businesses if you look hard enough.

dhimes• 15 years ago

But some things just aren't worth doing.

vaksel2• 15 years ago

Not much

Alexa ranking is 11 million, that means it get something like 100 hits a month

r00fus• 15 years ago

And I wonder how many of those who buy are actually porn-watchers who want to go the extra step to ensure their stash is invisible to their SO?

danneu• 15 years ago

Ya think anyone buying this product has an Alexa toolbar?

itmag3• 15 years ago

People really have girlfriends who won't let them watch porn in peace?

Hell, where I live, most chicks watch more porn than do the guys.

tlrobinson2• 15 years ago

Out of curiosity, where do you live?

itmag3• 15 years ago

It's called Sweden, buddy.

:)

leeoniya• 15 years ago

so that's where my porn is! AWESOME! (brb)

raganwald• 15 years ago

My current agreement is, “You can look at anything on my computer you want, just ask me first.” Looking without asking is a game misconduct. My failing to disclose something when asked would likewise be a game misconduct.

It’s just like allowing the police to search, but asking for a warrant first. Agreeing that we have to ask first puts up the hurdle of triggering a conversation.

TruthElixirX• 15 years ago

Still seems sort of shitty.

rgraham2• 15 years ago

Why not 'I trust you' and if something is an issue or a potential issue we can talk about it and try to reach an agreeable resolution?

jcromartie3• 15 years ago

Two things:

First: As a society, we should really examine the kind of impact internet porn is having on the lives of our young men. There is a growing body of knowledge around porn-induced ED in 20-somethings, among other myriad ways it negatively impacts the health and productivity of individuals and relationships.

Second: Who actually saves porn anymore?

(EDIT: it's not a "huge body of knowledge"... yet, it's growing)

slig3• 15 years ago

Their copy says that they scan for it also in the browser's history.

shin_lao• 15 years ago

It scans for cookies and history as well.

bitops3• 15 years ago

What is ED?

rglullis• 15 years ago

Erectile dysfunction.

mithaler• 15 years ago

I'm curious now: do you have citations for the "growing body of knowledge around porn-induced ED in 20-somethings"? I don't mean to undermine your point, I'm just interested in hearing more.

roc• 15 years ago

I would also be extremely curious to see those citations.

Because time and again, sociological "research" that attempts to show porn as bad winds up being exposed as the worst kind of science, when it's even remotely related to science to begin with.

I don't like to be so biased based on my (dis)agreement with a study's conclusions. But in the case of porn research, it just so often winds up being about as close to relevant as "Reefer Madness" is to the effects of drug use.

a-priori• 15 years ago

There is a huge and growing body of knowledge around porn-induced ED in 20-somethings, among other myriad ways it negatively impacts the health and productivity of individuals and relationships.

Source?

drivebyacct2• 15 years ago

As a society, we need to be less obsessed with being everyone's parents. (edit: not that I want my parents monitoring my porn intake either, frankly)

theBobMcCormick2• 15 years ago

I'd like to see some references to this supposed "growing body of knowledge", because it sounds like the kind of complete BS put out by anti-porn religious zealots.

As a society we need to move past this ridiculous idea that the enjoyment of sex, including sexual fantasization and pornography, are something to be ashamed of or feared. Sex and porn are normal parts of a healthy, adult sexuality.

jcromartie3• 15 years ago

> ... porn [is a normal part] of a healthy, adult sexuality

This is the kind of statement that should really be carefully evaluated. Smoking was "normal" once, too, along with many other unsavory bits of culture we have now moved on from.

See: http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/cupids-poisoned-arrow/20...

_delirium3• 15 years ago

A lot of the research, at least that I'm familiar with, actually comes a bit more from the left, generally pro-sex but skeptical of (at least some kinds of) porn, with the arguments being that porn tends to promote unrealistic expectations and a certain sort of attitude towards women, which get in the way of forming healthy real-world sexual relationships.

I'm not sure how solid any of the conclusions are, though, and I don't know what the ED research would be referring to. Here's one (slightly dated) meta-analysis that does find some association with aggression, especially following watching porn that involves violence: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1468-2958.1995....

Lambent_Cactus• 15 years ago

"a huge and growing body of knowledge"

... Laydeez

itmag3• 15 years ago

I suspect you are referring to this: http://yourbrainonporn.com/

vacri• 15 years ago

It's not a one-way street through - access to porn also reduces sexual violence.

It also helps people get over the 'shame' of having a body. Some people like the taboo of 'private parts', some people don't, and my personal opinion is that taboos for taboo's sake are pointless and should be squashed.

bryanh• 15 years ago

Private browsing mode, available in all leading browsers.

Wouldn't that effectively hide all traces of any browsing history locally, be it nefarious or otherwise?

That kind of response begs the question, if you have to hide it, is it wrong or not? Or is it more you don't want to be showing person Z some funny video and it autocompletes... something rather embarrassing.

Regardless, these guys have hit a nerve, can't see why they won't be printing money in the coming weeks with all the exposure they'll get.

safeaim• 15 years ago

I might be talking out of my ass, but I'm not sure if all browsers clear flash cookies, even in private mode.

JadeNB• 15 years ago

> Wouldn't that effectively hide all traces of any browsing history locally, be it nefarious or otherwise?

No; on the Mac, `dscacheutil` still knows about the sites you visit during private browsing, and I am certain that similar logs exist on other OS's. (Of course, your ISP also knows what sites you're visiting, but I guess that's what you meant by 'locally'.)

sixbrx• 15 years ago

Guys, both recent Windows and any unix-like OS support SEPARATE user accounts! I wouldn't trust anything less...

EDIT: In Windows, just beware to edit the ACL for the private user folder so that no other users can read its contents. I was very dissapointed that Windows 7 didn't do that by default. Files under the other users' folders by default are amenable to global search in explorer.

rokhayakebe• 15 years ago

But who downloads porn on their pc?

simonsarris• 15 years ago

Of course installing Picasa desktop and asking it to index the whole drive's photos will do pretty much do this exact thing for free.

In my dream world this website would be setup so that when someone clicks "Buy" it would simply go to a static page that reads: Congratulations! We've empirically determined that you need more communication in your relationship.

jzb3• 15 years ago

But do they still get the $20?

pavel_lishin• 15 years ago

$20 is pretty good for relationship counseling.

Tobu3• 15 years ago

A Picasa scan would work much better, insofar as it would, in fact, work. What images I've saved have the site's autogenerated numeric filenames, which from citricsquid's report would get ignored by this thing's piss-poor heuristics.

twodayslate• 15 years ago

There was a free checker like this a while back that used CSS :active links to check which sites were visited. Looks like these guys just monetized it.

Tobu3• 15 years ago

What the internet knows about you (inoperant in current Firefox and Chrome): http://wtikay.com/xxx

gfodor• 15 years ago

Of course, my first reaction to this is to figure out a counter-business to beat the detector. So it goes.

wanorris• 15 years ago

So go register hidemyporn.com or something and get to work.

For bonus points: secretly build both types of services and sell to both sides in an arms race. You could even offer an extra premium tier of each that defeats the non-premium tier of the other.

philwelch• 15 years ago

This comment reminds me of my radar detector, which is vulnerable to a police radar detector detector, but which itself has a radar detector detector detector.

sequoia• 15 years ago

I thought the author's pointing out of the supposed untruth that you don't have to download anything because you have to have Java to be a bit silly.

'Youtube claims you don't have to download anything to watch videos.... but AHA! You have to have Flash installed! Thought you could put one over on us, ehh?!?!'

Not really... Java and Flash are extremely common browser plugins.

hornbaker• 15 years ago

Hmmmm, I think I'll launch IsSheASpy.com and sell spy-software detection software.

rgraham2• 15 years ago

It'd be better to sell the software to clean up evidence in the first place. I bet you could sell it. It might not be a terrible business idea. Sigh.

citricsquid4• 15 years ago

Well, here goes... I'm "investing" $20 for the rest of HN to find out how accurate it is.

Okay so it's scanning... it has found a bunch of development things, gifs from my website work which isn't porn -- recycle binned stuff -- okay watching this, it's just bringing up every single file that contains a list of extensions; it's included under "videos" things like "DVDMaker sample" which certainly aren't porn. I don't think "passwordField.png" located in programData/skype is pornographic.

The websites it has found don't appear to be any I have ever visted, although some are (and they're popular sites) about half aren't. Either it's fabricating the websites or I've visited sites that embed data from these other sites? Plausible I guess.

What an awful product, albeit effectively marketed.

wr1472• 15 years ago

So you admit to having porn on your PC? I think it has done what it claims.

:D

_delirium3• 15 years ago

Sounds pretty fraudulent in that case, since the advertising materials clearly imply that it's detecting porn, not just listing all image files on the computer. I mean bad classification would be one thing, but not even attempting, while claiming that it does, seems like another. Maybe demand your $20 back?

citricsquid4• 15 years ago

I probably should, here's an example of the images it returned as porn: http://screensnapr.com/e/PEB3NG.png

vaksel2• 15 years ago

I'd check my PC to see if it was infected if I were you.

heelhook• 15 years ago

I bet he did it in a throw-away virtual machine. That thing has spyware written all over it.

jonmwords3• 15 years ago

Do you have any way of capturing the actual JAR? Our Sophos security friend wants to analyze it, but we don't know how to get it.

citricsquid4• 15 years ago

edit: http://pastie.org/private/jun6syyaoe2uynjbrla4a

therandomguy• 15 years ago

Thanks for doing this.. for science

alex_c• 15 years ago

Just for kicks, did you check if it even looks at hidden files or folders?

allwein• 15 years ago

I'll admit it's probably finding a lot of false positives, but I could make an argument for many of the files you said it flagged.

Contains "ass": ui-bg_glass_55_fbfgee_1x400.png

Path contains "x", contains "butt", "up" could indicate up-skirt: combo-button-up.png

Contains "stroke", contains "16": stock-selection-stroke-16.png

Contains "cock", contains "x": xlr_pro_mortal_cocktail.png

Contains "hole": whole.png

So basically anything with an x, a possible age, and any number of flagged words/slang/abbreviations, etc could be causing these to be flagged.

CWuestefeld2• 15 years ago

That's plausible, but suggests that the creator never tested it on real-world data. Either way, it's really bad development work.

zellyn• 15 years ago

citricsquid - thanks for the info. Did it give any false negatives for you?

To all complaining about the product giving false positives: think about it from the user's perspective. If you ran this program, and it showed you no results, you'd probably just think it didn't work. Showing you a scattering of false positives "proves" that it at least did something. And checking down the list makes you feel like you completed your audit.

middus• 15 years ago

Thanks! Now ask for a refund or file a chargeback with your CC company, because it did not work as advertised.

Revisor• 15 years ago

Find my porn? Why, it's right there in the folder called Porn next to Movies and Music. And not only does my SO know, we talk about what appeals to us.

To be honest about it to each other and above all to myself belongs to a healthy and open sexuality.

ianferrel• 15 years ago

Mine is in a directory called "Not Porn", which accomplishes all the same things, and is also a fun joke.

larrys• 15 years ago

Had a customer a few years ago, a non-profit in NYC. They had a link on their site which said either porn or nude women. When you clicked the link you brought up their donation page.

abstractbill• 15 years ago

I'm genuinely curious - how many people in this day and age still feel the need to hide porn? Doesn't that seem a bit infantile?

jjcm• 15 years ago

I hide mine in the folder on my desktop labeled "porn". Neither myself or my girlfriend have any problems with it, but I know plenty of my friends who would be offended if they saw it. On my laptop I keep it in a truecrypt folder with a password I share with the girlfriend (because she adds to it and uses it, not because she wants to spy); that way if I have any stuff I need to do at work with the laptop I can be comfortable knowing it's not going to pop up in a presentation. I think what's changed since I was 16 and had a deeply hidden folder is that I'm no longer embarrassed about it, I just worry that I'll accidentally offend someone else.

JohnLBevan• 15 years ago

http://xkcd.com/981/

ja272• 15 years ago

Truecrypt filesystem with a copy of Portable Firefox, Portable VLC and image viewers.

rsanchez12• 15 years ago

Yeah, just put it in the "cloud", or on one of those tube sites.

ja272• 15 years ago

I do. Not so much from my wife, but from the kids and co-workers. Nothing like seeing a dude's browser history pop up on the conference room projector.

verroq2• 15 years ago

Perhaps your pornography collection isn't on a topic that's socially acceptable. Lets say... scat?

Shenglong• 15 years ago

Detecting porn eh? This reminds me of China's Green Dam initiative, which ended up banning Garfield, claiming that it's porn.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2009-06-15/green-dam-it-chinese-s...

tlrobinson2• 15 years ago

I'm going to create "Find Her Porn Finder". It will detect when this piece of crap is installed on your machines and email you with the suggestion to break up with them immediately.

gwern• 15 years ago

Part of the point of OP was that you don't even get a thing to install.

bilbo0s• 15 years ago

They could make a fortune selling the list of names of women who bought this software.

Then bill that service out as something like 'Girlfriend Screening'.

tdfx• 15 years ago

I've found, from personal experience as friends/neighbors/family's unofficial tech support person, that there's a surprising number of women that look at porn. Whereas guys might blush when their viewing habits are exposed, women would probably live the rest of their lives in shame.

Maybe "Find Their Porn" would open up a greater market? Most guys laugh at the prospect of their girlfriends/wives being mad about looking at porn, but they would probably fall into a spiral of insecurity if they found out their significant other was looking at other guys for sexual pleasure.

namank• 15 years ago

Woah...thats what everyone's worried about? The fact that it doesn't accurately find porn?!

I can't even get past the fact that I'm supposed to allow a website to go through the contents of my disk!

For crying out loud, it doesn't even have SSL or any other third party verfiers!

huuleon• 15 years ago

I think you should reduce the price and get feedback to increase the quality of your product. $20 is quite expensive for just some invalid information. Maybe charge somewhere form $1-$5. Get more people to test it and find more ways to better your product.