There are programs that operate on a user's computer and will highlight and link words on a website to advertisers. These "contextual advertising links" are not links created by the web site creator, but created by the program to happen on the computer in which it is installed. Programs that do this are:

Note: These programs are usually installed or "bundled" with popular file sharing programs like Kazaa, LimeWire, iMesh. For more information and an article from News.com, click here.

For example, the word "homework" on any web site will appear as a yellow highlighted link on the web site, and if the link is clicked, you are taken to an advertiser web site. To see screenshots (provided by ThiefWare.com) of how Ezula works, please click here

This program only affects the computer that it is installed on, and not the actual web site or others who visit the web site and do not have these programs installed on their computers.

For more information on these programs please go to these links:

For more comprehensive information on these programs:

Detection

To detect if you have Ezula or Surf+ on your computer, please click here

There is a free program, AdAware, that will remove these types of programs from your computer, as well as, web sites with manual removal instructions:

Prevention

To prevent these programs from affecting your web site, here are some helpful links:

Additional Notes: