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I am trying to browse to the following URL on archive.org:

https://web.archive.org/web/20020304231443/http://www.everlore.com/items/items.asp?mode=show&IID=641

This redirects me to an error page which says:

This page is not available on the web

because of server error

But the URL displayed is:

http://takeoverAd.html/?https:%2F%2Fweb.archive.org%2Fweb%2F20031126232714%2Fhttp:%2F%2Fwww.everlore.com%2Fitems%2Fitems.asp%3Fmode=show&IID=641

Why is archive.org added http://takeoverAd.html/? to the beginning of the URL? And is this causing a page which might actually exist to be displayed as missing?

I see the same result in both Chome and Edge.

Zhro
  • 957

1 Answers1

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I'm not sure exactly what takeoverAd.html was since I can't find much documentation on it but it seems like it was a malicious ad campaign. I found some mention of it on some Civ forums here: https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/infected-with-a-virus-when-i-refresh-cfc-twice-now.218440/page-4

If you google "takeoverAd.html" with the quotes you'll see results where other URLs were corrupted with takeoverAd.html. My guess is it added itself at the beginning of a link, forcing you to visit the takeoverAd.html file instead. The site you are trying to view archives of may have been victim to the ad campaign when the snapshots were taken.

I don't see a 2002 snapshot for that site but there is a 2000 one that works: https://web.archive.org/web/20000303035024/http://www.everlore.com/items/items.asp?mode=show&IID=641

The 2003 snapshot has the same issue as yours: https://web.archive.org/web/2/http://takeoverAd.html?https:%2F%2Fweb.archive.org%2Fweb%2F20031126232714%2Fhttp:%2F%2Fwww.everlore.com:80%2Fitems%2Fitems.asp%3Fmode=show&IID=641

MC10
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