I've noticed recently hpHosts has been slow (much slower than usual) to load site reports, the homepage doesn't indicate new additions since August 2019, and the site report pages often have "Failed to resolve" errors on the report's IP address and hosting boxes. What's happened to hpHosts, and will it ever be brought back to a workable state?
Greetings, The issue has been reported and I believe is being worked on, however if anyone from the team has further details then I defer to their first-hand knowledge.
March 19, 20205 yr Author The issue is getting worse; attempting to load a site report now gives a HTTP 500 error.
Hello @BFeely: I like to to use hpHosts for onesies and twosies. I just ran a lookup and your observation may have been short lived as my search worked. How's for you now?
March 20, 20205 yr Root Admin The site is up and running for me as well. However it has always been a very slow website. I'm not sure where it's actually hosted but it's always been slow to access for me. But no 500 error for me. http://hosts-file.net/ 1
March 31, 20205 yr Author Now it appears hpHosts has been taken down and replaced by something called "Malwarebytes Browser Guard" and I can no longer look up site ratings.
24 minutes ago, BFeely said: Now it appears hpHosts has been taken down and replaced by something called "Malwarebytes Browser Guard" and I can no longer look up site ratings. It has been discontinued. I am sure someone can go into more detail. @MysteryFCM
March 31, 20205 yr Root Admin We are currently restructuring hpHosts and it will no longer be updated. You could however check out our browser extension product. Malwarebytes Browser Guardhttps://www.malwarebytes.com/browserguard Filters out annoying ads and scams while blocking trackers that spy on you. The browser extension that beats the scammers Malwarebytes Browser Guard crushes unwanted and unsafe content, giving you a safer and faster browsing, Not only that, it is the world’s first browser extension that can identify and stop tech support scams. We take on the bad guys so you don’t have to. Edited March 31, 20205 yr by AdvancedSetup updated information
March 31, 20205 yr Author It's unfortunate that you would delete a service that has been so useful for third party filters. 2
March 31, 20205 yr Root Admin Yes, we can understand but unfortunately we're no longer able to support that service
It is also getting to the point that trying to use a HOSTS file in Windows is becoming more trouble than it is worth with Windows 10 making it very difficult. Static block lists are also a very reactive solution to a problem that changes rapidly in that new malicious sites pop up constantly and often have short lives so that by the time they reach a static block list they might not even exist any more and could have already been replaced by some other site which is unknown to the makers of the block list and which itself will soon be replaced by yet another site. This is why a more proactive behavior based solution is necessary and why using a combination of tools to safeguard browsing is important. I do still use a large HOSTS file for blocking content, however it is not my only tool and definitely is not what I rely on primarily for blocking malicious content on the web.
I used to use HP-Host research purposes. Now that it is no longer available, are there any newer alternate resources that you would recommend?
13 minutes ago, AdvancedSetup said: Thanks @AdvancedSetup, I'll shoot him a private message when I get the chance.
hpHosts was used in default installations of Pi-hole, a network-wide adblocker, specifically its "Ad servers" list. Lists have also been used by other third parties. Shutting this down and removing access to the data to me seems quite short-sighted.
I am sure is not financially feasible to manually maintain that database with thousands + edits needed daily.
On 5/7/2020 at 6:56 PM, AdvancedSetup said: No we will not be providing additional resources at this time Does this mean you have ceased all partnerships with WOT? If so, that is very unfortunate for both Malwarebytes and WOT users.
I do not think it was "partnership" per say. It was that WOT just used the HP hosts lists like many others who did the same to incorporate them into it. There was nothing wrong with that because they were free to download. There are thousands or more of additions and removals a day to keep a list like that accurate and viable is next to impossible. Most bad sites come and go within a 48 to 72 hour time period. When Malwarebytes hired the developer of HP Hosts I am sure it was to integrate his expertise in to Malwarebytes products. On a personal note, I have not used or recommended WOT in a very long time. It was more of a crowd voting system that flagged good sites and missed bad ones, at least back then.
You can probably still access the website on the Wayback Machine, aka the Internet Archive. I've been using the Microsoft Feedback Hub and talking to some people, and they might be making some changes to the HOSTS file so that it's less troublesome to use. Hopefully.
1 hour ago, Amaroq_Starwind said: You can probably still access the website on the Wayback Machine, aka the Internet Archive. Even so, There are not going to be any additions or subtractions. That list would be static. AKA next to useless if not getting updates.
May 21, 20205 yr Root Admin Absolutely. Just start your own database and start working on collecting and categorizing the data. That's how most of these type of services started out, some of them over 10 years ago.
This topic is now closed to further replies.