0-iframes basics
What is generally called 0-Iframes, is a code added to the script of the page making it so that what is in the code is on the page but can't be seen by the visitors.
This code can be totally non offensive like a basic counter so the webmaster can know how many visitors came to his site.
The code can also be used to redirect visitors to other sites without them seeing the site. This way the webmaster boosts his alexa rating with an amount of fake visits for example. Webmasters can use it for various reasons, boosting traffic or having credits for fake visits to the programs they are affiliated with etc ...
The code can also be used to automatically download nasties to the visitors computer or to make them do autosearches without them even knowing it.
Those 0-frames are often well hidden and often don't show in the source codes.
Two tools are freely available to check if a site has 0-iframes :
1. Jutaky's detector : this one doesn't request any download, one simply goes to the detector page, adds the url one wants to check in the box and hit 'analyze', the detector then will give the 0-iframes found.
2. Mvent2's Cheating Iframe detector: an easy little download is necessary to use this free tool, then when surfing the net, the visitor is informed when the page he visits has 0-iframes on it.
Over time, the 0-iframes are more and more well hidden and even the two tools can't catch all of them but they already offer a huge help.
More information about 0-iframes can be found here : Iframes explained by 2kids2pets and Jutaky or by doing a search on the forum or by asking questions.
Discussion on GPF : How do I use the detector July 3, 2006
Those 0-iframes at times are put in a rotator, this is why even the best POs checking the incoming ads might miss them as they would have to check the sites over and over again in case it is in a rotator with many many different urls. Also, at times the page owners add the codes when the ads have been checked and processed already.
GPF doesn't have a team dedicated to look up sites with 0-iframes, this is a members help members section, so if anyone encounters a site with dubious 0-iframes, feel free to report it in the report subsections hereunder.
Feel free to ask any question or post any additional infos hereunder, the informations resulting from the discussions in this thread will be added in this first post when we go.