My Internet connection is provided by this Rogers group here in Canada, and soon after I started using it I was appalled to discover the degree to which they will go to make a buck. Normally when you type in the address of a web server that doesn't actually exist you'll get an error message telling you as such. What Rogers does is to hijack that failed query and redirect you to an advertisement page with a "helpful" search bar. (I've heard that others also do this - that doesn't piss me off any less.) This (a) makes it impossible to simply correct a typo in the address bar, because of the redirection, (b) makes it impossible for an application to determine whether or not a server actually exists, and © makes the whole process slow as dog shit on a cold day.

There's an opt-out option that doesn't actually opt out. What they do instead is to put a cookie in your browser that tells the system to redirect to a fake Internet Explorer error page. It doesn't fix the problem, it isn't persistent across other devices in the same network, it isn't even persistent on the same device if you occasionally use a different browser (like I do for various reasons). It's not a solution, it's a bloody slap in the face.

If there really was a way to "break the Internet", pulling shit like this is it.

Finally I just now implemented a real solution, by changing the DNS server addresses in my router's config (which I'm loathed to play with because I don't actually own it, but screw it - this is pissing me off too much). Instead of using Rogers' deceitful host-name lookup servers, now I'm using 4.2.2.[1-6]. No more DNS hijacking! Yay! What's more, I'm not waiting upwards of 10 fucking seconds for random domains to be resolved anymore - now it's an almost instant response, like it bloody-well should be. I can't believe I had been trying to put up with that bullshit.