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I've redacted the links in this question, because

  • they did not link directly to content, but to a website from which to download the content
  • the website in question opened advertisement popups with partially insecure contents. The popups reappeared after a browser restart, i had to clear my history to get rid of them.

Was this the right action to take, or could there be a better editing style? Should I take any other action on questions with potentially harmful links?

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    The preferred approach would probably be to flag the question for moderator attention and be explicit in the flag about what the issue is,
    – DavidPostill Mod
    Commented Dec 16, 2021 at 18:01
  • Why do you think ad content needs to be "secure" (which just means encrypted)? Popups are standard functionality on a vast number of websites, there's nothing wrong with them.
    – kreemoweet
    Commented Mar 22, 2022 at 18:10
  • @kreemoweet "The popups reappeared after a browser restart, i had to clear my history to get rid of them." I consider persistent popups as malicious and potentially harmful. It's called browser hijacking.
    – 1NN
    Commented Mar 22, 2022 at 18:14
  • @kreemoweet I've seen websites deliver crypto miners that hid behind the taskbar like that. Advertisement does not need popups. Automatic popups without user action are bad practice and should be banned by any serious webmaster. Advertisers who deliver unwanted popups should be suspendend from the relative advertisement networks.
    – 1NN
    Commented Mar 22, 2022 at 18:27

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
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Reassuming various moderator comments:

  • The preferred approach would be to flag the question for moderator attention and be explicit in the flag about what the issue is.
  • A comment with a warning for other users about the issue would be useful, too.

As long as linked content is not outright harmful or clearly spam, refrain from deleting a link by yourself.

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