We've developed a system to help webmasters create custom toolbars for their web site. (Like Google, Alexa and so forth.) The question comes up: At what point does a toolbar become 'evil'?

For example, webmasters of some very major sites have asked us create toolbars for them with the following features. (I've noted how we've 'backed off' the evilness a little):

- Change the user's browser home page without asking. (We also added an option to ask the user before making the change.)

- Change the user's browser default search page from MSN to something else without asking. (We also added an option to ask the user before making the change.)

- Disable all other toolbars the user has installed every time they open a browser window. (We added an option to only disable the other toolbars once.)

- Track and record all keywords used when the toolbar's search box is used.

- Present advertising in pop-ups and on the toolbar itself as the user navigates to different web sites.

One could argue whether features like this are good or evil. We're just selling the gun -- if people want to shoot themselves or their friends with it -- we have no control over that.

There is a pretty wide 'gray area' here. For example, if you create a toolbar that records keywords people are searching for -- it could be considered 'spyware'. However, if the keywords are not able to be linked to any specific toolbar user, and are only used to help the web site owner determine when he/she should add new pages to their web site -- is it still evil?

The trouble is that the 'toolbar technology' is quite generic -- for example, the same technology used to update the toolbar normally can also be used to create toolbars that present competing advertising to the web site currently being viewed.

Likewise, the same technology that allows us to highlight keywords on the web page (like Google's toolbar), can be used to alter links and replace affiliate IDs (like 'parasiteware' and 'scumware').

I created an eBook, "Creating Toolbars for Fun and Profit!" that does describe some applications of custom toolbars -- but don't really talk much about the potentially evil applications. Maybe I should?

Do you know were I can download that ebook? sounds interesting.

Thats pretty interesting how spammy the web has gotton though it dosent suprize me the new webmasters want hits fast and dont want to spend time doing it. Lazy lazy lazy.

The eBook comes with the sample kit download -- just fill out the form here, and you'll be sent the link:

Download Toolbar Sample Kit

Cheers, Marty...

I think anything that downloads or changes my current settings is evil personally and if I do come upon a site that does and I know it, I will never go back there.

My computer is set how I have it for a reason. Your first 3 items would totally piss me off.

When something like this makes me crazy, I would assume it would to others as well so therefore I wouldn't incorporate any of those items into my websites or products either.

I certainly think you should discuss the positive as well as the negatives in your book so that people don't do something later without realizing the full impact (loss of traffic, etc.)

Thanks for the link

Whenever someone requests a 'feature' that I know is a bad thing, I always TRY to get them to think about the consequences -- however, we still gotta eat, so we generally will create the feature and charge them heavily for it.

The first thing I tell them is that if they create an 'evil' toolbar, what will probably happen is that they will:

a) get bad publicity

b) get their toolbar added to the lists of spyware/parasiteware/scumware products

c) get their toolbar added to the removal list of adaware and other spyware removal products

However, in the USA there are a lot of people with the mentality, "we'll do whatever we want NOW, and if we get nailed, we'lll have our lawyers handle it LATER".

Many features of any product or service can be used for good or for evil. A car, for example can be used to drive someone to the hospital -- or to put them there -- depending on how it is used.

A good example is the URL reporting feature of a toolbar. This is where the toolbar reports back to a server whatever URLs the user of the toolbar visits.

The evil part is pretty obvious: spyware

The good part may not be so obvious. For example, the toolbar could customize itself, based upon the web site being viewed, to present the user with different buttons and controls that help them to use/navigate the current site.

A good application of this is one that I'll be launching sometime in the future -- and that is, a single toolbar that gives you 'clones' of toolbars used on the top 1,000 Internet sites. For example, if you navigate to google.com, the toolbar would reconfigure itself to give you a 'clone' of Google's toolbar, then if you navigate to Yahoo!, the toolbar would re-create itself to give you a clone of Yahoo!'s toolbar, etc. (I call this a 'u-bar' or 'universal toolbar' -- instead of installing/removing 1,000 different toolbars -- you would need just ONE!

Anyway, for this particular application, the toolbar DOES report URLs you are visiting back to a server, but the ONLY use made of the information is in order to provide the toolbar user with a new toolbar and better browsing experience. (A GOOD thing!

One of my big peeves is 'drive-by-downloads' -- where someone starts the download/installation process without your knowledge or consent. (You still have to 'accept' the download, but many less knowledgable users may do this without understanding what is happening.)

Fortunately, nobody has asked for that ability (yet...)