Today I decided to update my MySpace page and I discovered that some of my YouTube links weren’t working. After a closer look, I noticed that all of my links were now changed to www.msplinks.com. At first I was shocked and my only thoughts were “I got owned, but how?” I looked for other links on the page and they still pointed to the correct locations. That made it even more strange to me. I decided to do a quick Google search to see what I could find. It seems that MySpace started doing this to the links in the comments section a while ago. Now they have changed it to rewrite all links in your profile. There are still some links that are not affected (yet?) including img and object tags.
I would like to take the time now to bitch and moan because I have a large number of links that are in my profile. I don’t have a copy of them before the change so now they are all obfuscated and unreadable. I figured I would just add a HTML comment to keep track of what they actually are. WRONG! MySpace filters HTML comments. So what about using the “title” attribute? Nope. Once again filtered. So I made up a attribute called “comments” so that I can keep track of what they are.
Why are all my YouTube links broken? Looking at an actual link it seems pretty obvious that the garbage is just a mime encoded (Base64) string. Using my powers of mIRC scripting it actually decodes to 01http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wnjwjd8ufw. Seems like it is a valid link but if you notice the string for the video has been converted to lowercase. The real string should be 2WNjWJd8ufw and after re-encoding the link it becomes this. So does it work? Yeah, just don’t click on it from here as it checks the referrer and will redirect you to MySpace. That means if you have a YouTube link you will have to encode it yourself until the noobs (take that!) at MySpace fix it.
What can I do to bypass the MSP Links? I could probably embed a Flash app for all of the links, but many of them are closely tied to the style of my profile. I don’t want to make this change and waste a few hours learning to do this simple task in Flash. I don’t normally use Greasemonkey but it seems like this would be a perfect task for it. I could simply rewrite all the MSP Links to their actual location. You can find the link to the script here to convert the links back to the original. You can also find the link for the script over at userscripts.org.
The Greasemonkey script runs each time a page is loaded and searches the entire page for any links that contain www.msplinks.com and then tries to decode them. You must first install the addon in Firefox before you click on the script to install it. It will only run on the domains for MySpace.
Update (July 04, 2007)
It has been brought to my attention that you can simply bypass MSP Links for now by leaving out http:// portion. This makes me happy because it is so simple and easy. I’ve just tested it today with a link to YouTube and seems to be working for now.
Update (July 08, 2007)
You cannot bypass MSP Links anymore by leaving out the http:// portion. It will now prefix your link with http://www.myspace.com/.
Update (December 07, 2007)
MySpace made me laugh today when I saw that they were trying to do the same thing as Facebook with the “Friend Update” section. I also tested to see if links to YouTube are still broke. Before the link is converted to a MSP Link the URL is converted to lowercase, which broke links to YouTube. Today it seems that they are now being encoded correctly.
Update (February 29, 2008)
I updated the MSP Links script to convert links in text areas back to the original location. This was in response to a comment to add the functionality. Enjoy. You can get the new version from here or here.
Update (September 09, 2009)
And you thought this article was dead! I’ve been making sure the links still work and I noticed that you are no longer redirected to MySpace if you click on a MSP Link from another domain.
Agreed good article.
ok im computer retarded and i was just wondering what you do with that script? like where do u put it?
Devon, you will need to install Greasemonkey first and then the next time you click on the script it should ask you if you want to install it.
i wrote about the mpslinks thing back in april. i haven’t done much about it, just figured my links were now worthless (as if links from myspace were doing me any good anyway).
i think i may be confused about your script. does it just change what you are seeing in the status bar? or does it actually remove or block the msplinks url?
are the search engines now seeing my link with anchor text to my site as a link to my site, or are they still seeing the msplinks.com link?
it seems like my links are there, but when i go to edit my profile again, they’ve been converted back to msplinks again.
can you please explain more about the script?
When you use the script it rewrites the msplinks URLs when you visit MySpace. It is only client side and doesn’t change the URLs on the servers. When you click on the link it goes directly to the website instead of being decoded and redirected though msplinks. Also, when you mouse is over a link it will show the actual link before you click on it.
Interesting to find someone else whose reaction to this msplinks bullshit is (1) to rant about it and (2) to write a script to convert the links back to normal.
Only my rant uses more colourful language and my script is implemented as a bookmarklet.
http://pigeonsnest.co.uk/stuff/crapstuff/msplinks.html
(fx: actually looks at smert script) Oh and my script is (a) standalone, doesn’t @include any other code, and (b) works on textareas as well as anchors, so it unspazzes the links in your profile when you’re editing it and you can see what you’re editing.
While it appears to be a crackers/phishers paradise the whole point of msplinks from what I understand is to be able to blacklist malicious websites. That way you don’t get redirected to it if it turns out to be bad. I think this approach is futile though and I don’t like not being able to determine if I actually want to visit the website before click on it.
The annoying thing for me is that the links I set up to work with my carefully crafted DIV overlay do not work, in fact they have completely disappeared (even linked images).
My profile is completely wrecked now.
I’m assuming that some carefully applied CSS styles might make them reappear again – anyone have any ideas how to do this?
Perhaps it’s time to give MS the old heave-ho
Jason: Yes, I agree. That is how I understand it, I too think it is futile… a quick peek at Google is enough to find plenty of pages from the black hats who have found ways to continue their evil deeds unhindered… it hasn’t stopped them but it has deprived people of the opportunity to inspect the links before clicking, thereby opening the door to more unpleasantness.
So is there a way to fix the MSPLinks on your page that are not translated correctly? I had something on my page that linked to a url with upper case letters in it, but it went dead with MSPlinks. I had to change my profile link to that site’s home page (which had no upper-case letters) instead of to the page I wanted others to view. Is there a way to fix my link so that it’ll go to the right page? Or is MySpace at least working to fix this?
If someone would like to email me the answer on my MySpace page, I would appreciate it very much. I just found this forum by accident.
Thank you.
Yes, for example if you wanted to encode http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8mreOydwFT8 to work with MSPLinks you will need to mime encode (base64) it. There is one online at http://www.motobit.com/util/base64-decoder-encoder.asp it isn’t as nice as the one I found a while ago which used java script. Anyways enter 01http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8mreOydwFT8 (WP converts this to a URL which it isn’t suppose to be) which will output MDFodHRwOi8vd3d3LnlvdXR1YmUuY29tL3dhdGNoP3Y9OG1yZU95ZHdGVDg= then you just append that to http://www.msplinks.com. The final result looks like this. You can’t link to it from here since it checks the referrer.
You can still use the www tag but it’s not clickable.
Also if you have a jukebox player code, the one’s that plays music instantly whenever someone visits your page, msp links doesn’t affect that (for now). If you look inside the coding the links are not changed, maybe the object tag filters msp links. I would post the code here, but I’m sure myspace has spies looking at pages on the net
I just realized spammers are taking advantage of msplinks with URLs like this: http://www.msplinks.com.asd34fHKLiN.nldesdhoo.hkhdHlKEbdaee.dD1×41.pcdxxr4.cn
no mime encoding there…just some bullsh1t DNS entries on a .cn domain that takes you to a “log in” page.
DISCLAIMER: don’t log into that page.
That is interesting. Firefox correctly reports that it might be a forgery. It even redirects you to the MySpace login you would get after you typed the wrong password.
DISCLAIMER: If you type your password into the site your account will probably be hijacked. You shouldn’t view the page either unless you are confident that it doesn’t contain any browser exploits.
im wanting to link up my free hosted website at t35.com and when i try to link it up on myspace all it does is if i send the link in a message all it shows is this when they click the link : http://messaging.myspace.com/big-tony... it automatically puts all that crap in front of my site url thinking its on myspace. is there any way to get around this? i have tried that online base64 encoder exactly as said and only a blank page showed up, any suggestions? the only one i have found to work is typing the url out in paint and sending the picture..lol
This MSP Links thing is unbelievable – how come its changing all the links on my own website? I was under the impression this only happens to Myspace profiles – but all the ligitimate, non harmful links on my website have been converted into this shite? How do they have the right to do this?
after going the entire spring & summer without the internet, imagine my surprise when i found out that MY space had been obnoxiously & belligerently HIJACKED and turned into THEIR space. i use MY space to network, and have used the site since it was a server in some dudes basement, so my page is extensive with links. all rendered NULL & VOID by this malicious coding.
i am not an html person, or a coder myself. i do have firefox & grease monkey, but when i see talk about flash, or some other method, you go into uncharted waters with me. what little i know is scant on the web authoring. so the question is, can you translate the jargon into something a normal myspace user can comprehend & implement?
i just want to know how to make the links clickable. just need to know what to do.
Sounds like you will have to clear out all of the fields and start your profile from scratch.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adobe_Flash
I was only speculating on other ways to get around MSP links and preventing MySpace from changing them. That probably is beyond normal comprehension to normal MySpace users. You must learn to crawl before you can walk so they say. The greasemonkey script only changes the links on your computer so that you can see where they lead (put your mouse over it) to without having to open the link. It doesn’t permanently change them or prevent MySpace from changing them back to MSP Links again the next time you save your profile. MySpace converts all external links to MSP Links which look like http://www.msplinks.com/ followed by a Base64 encoded string.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Base64
Before it becomes Base64 they prefix a 01 to the beginning and make it all lower case. This breaks links to YouTube. The only way to fix that is to encode them your self.
01http://linktotheactualsite
This makes it difficult to update your MySpace and change a URL since you can’t clearly read it. Long before the URL is flagged as malicious someone can use it to hide where they are sending you such as a fake MySpace login. If you view the source code of the HTML you will notice the msplinks are unchanged. Highlight and select the entire page or use (Ctrl + A) then right click and view the generated source. The links should look normal now which you can save by copying them. I recommend making a text file for each field (about me, etc.) and edit that on your computer and copy that info into the correct field on MySpace. This way you can keep a plain vanilla copy of your profile and you don’t have to worry about guessing where msplinks lead to.
1. There are few solutions to the msplinks
2. Don’t waste time using ANY links in Bulletins
3.Jason above me is correct in saying back up all
code to text files, before you post to myspace.
4.Make a Myspace Group!!!! And DO not add ” ” around your http://www.links.com SAVE YOUR CODE BEFORE YOU POST IT
The groups profiles are FREE of MSPLINKS and have been for awhile…check out my group
http://groups.myspace.com/addmyspacefriends
5. I have had ok luck with widgets (they all are still NEW)
myspace can block your widget from bulletins…but not your profile, not every widget maker can get past the msplinks, so test it out…
6. use leader links in your profile to connect your group
here leave the ” ” on your links note class=”leaderLink”
sample:
ADD+FRINEDS Group Leader: Mac B
this code is not changed to msplinks when posted in the profile
and if your myspace group can have NORMAL code
and all bulletins links are gone…
the solution is:
make a group, add the join code to your profile
post bulletins using only the TEXT URL of your group
I have over 50k freinds and 17k in my group since 8-05-07
today is Dec 4th 07
I will continue the FIGHT
Myspace is blocking links to feedburner.com where I keep my podcast. converting to base64 doesn’t help. links to feedburner generate the generic myspace.com page.
very annoying.
is there a way around this ?
thanks
BB
Are people trying to subscribe to your feed via the msplink? I used http://feeds.feedburner.com/JohnChowDotCom as an example since I don’t know of any other places that use FeedBurner
Wow they are blocking it. I thought maybe it was missing the referrer when people clicked on your link. There isn’t anything you can do about it if the link gets converted to msplinks.com sadly. They are blocking a legit site and I’m not sure who you could contact. Maybe you can message “TOM” from MySpace and tell him how much of a douche bag he is :S
Thanks Jason.
Well I wrote Myspace a couple of times. I’ll let you guess if the answered …
I’m trying via feedburner folk now. I need this to work.
cheers,
BB
MySpace sucks. Yes, they are still blocking Feedburner links. Whether it is intentional or not I have no idea, but it is way lame.
Every time I click on myspace, some org. in USA keeps asking me to update, is this company trustful. Here in Australia, myspace is supposedly owned by a Newsservice MSN, I too have had problems with BlogAdorn,which it seems,this woman was using copyright material and was threatened by being sued, so as she closed her page, all images were deleted too.
I have read the above comments, thanx Jason, some comments I can read, others are too far up in the clouds for this retired trucker, hey, I have been playing Oblivion for 8 months now, level 38,you youngins have a whole culture of computer speak I wouldn’t understand if you hit me in the face.
Take care,
Wolfenn
Yeah I agree that MySpace has overstepped its filtering by blocking feedburner (perhaps a shady business practice). Sadly there isn’t much you can do about it :S
No I wouldn’t advise updating anything from a webpage that says you have to update. There is nothing to update by viewing MySpace. Depending on where you get this message you either have Spyware/Malware or someone has tricked you into putting something in your profile that is causing that. There could be other reasons but that is my guess.
Hey, I’ve got a myspace profile for my band. I’m not a programmer but I do understand some basic stuff. I’ve just been updating my profile and I’ve put links on my page to other social networks like Facebook, Reverbnation and Last FM. Myspace changes all the links to MPSlinks, but when I try to click on the links in Internet Explorer (v.7) I get redirected to Zone Alarm page stating a “High Risk Website Warning!” and I’m not allowed to go to the webpages. I’ve got Zone Alarm & Zone Alarm Spy Blocker installed on my PC and I use it’s firewall. This just made me think, since a lot of people do have Zone Alarm & Zone Alarm Spy Blocker, some of our fans or people checking out our profile won’t be able to click on these links! Thats really annoying! Is there anything that can be done on the actual myspace profle so that everybody browsing the profile will get the actual correct links!?
There is nothing you can do to permanently change the MSPLinks to the correct URL. You can use my Greasemonkey script or someone else’s to change them in YOUR browser only. You might want to make a blog or a webpage with directions on how to disable ZoneAlarm if you are worried about people not being able to access your links.
If you absolutely have to use outgoing links via Flash in MySpace, I devised a pretty clean workaround. My MySpace page features a customized Flash news system which enables users to read my current news via XML. At the bottom of each article, there is a button that when clicked provides an external link regarding the corresponding article. You’re probably wondering how the hell I was able to achieve this on MySpace, but it’s rather simple! Once the button is clicked, the link is automatically copied to the Windows Clipboard and then all the user has to do is paste the link in their browser window! Since they would most likely be unfamilar with this type of procedure, it would probably be in your best interest to place a tooltip over the button onRollOver instructing them to click the button and then paste the new link in their browser window. To see my working example, please visit: http://www.myspace.com/jamiemichels
Hey. I’m working on a div overlay but think I am encountering the MSPLINKS problem. My particular problem is that I am creating links to my comments and to my pictures. When the links are clicked, however, the browser is directed to a blank page. What can I do. I am using the same link that I see when I click on the my pictures/my comments link in my homepage. Is that the problem? What should I do?
Hooray! After searching the net for a few hours before and after my last post, I came upon this site. I implemented the fix which causes the fixed links to be un-obfuscated and actually point/direct you to the correct site. In other words, I was able to bypass the msplinks in my own div overlay to correctly display and connect me to the page I wanted to link to, which happened to be the my comments and my pictures pages without connecting to a blank page as before. Here it is
http://www.zucye.net/apuntes-tecnicos/myspace-bypass-msplinks/
Myspace sucks but if I’m gonna have one, it might as well be prettty dope. Thanks guys. I hope the fix works for you.