O2 Age Verification - Redirection

[Anonymous]

All of a sudden when I try to log into certain sites (betfair for example), my browser gets redirected to the following page:
http://bango.net/O2AV/wAV.aspx
This has suddenly started happening today, and to be honest my spider senses start twitching when seemingly random sites start asking me for credit card details, especially ones that say they are O2 but have a web address that has bears no resemblance to the official site.
Anybody else had this?
Had what appeared to be a random spam email in my mobile broadband inbox today (which obviously you have no choice but to read cos the softare automatically opens all new messages regardless of who they are from!), so concerned it might be something nasty that has infected the modem/software as they both operate the other side of my firewall (I assume).
Any advice would be appreciated!
Many thanks

[adamtemp64]

this has been discussed before and bango provide the age verification for o2
you should only need to do it once and they charge £1 but credit back £2.50 first time. see here http://www.o2.co.uk/support/generalhelp ... ockunblock
several threads about it as well

[Anonymous]

Ah, fair enough, I only browsed the first 2 pages of the forum for answers to this query as I thought it was a new development!
Appreciate the brisk reply, much obliged!

[Anonymous]

Hi,
I also found this notification when i went on the internet this evening, and can I say that I am reeeeally annoyed! Fair enough that O2 wants to protect its younger members from material that is unsuitable for them but firstly not only am I over 18 but I have a 24month contract for mobile broadband and am CLEARY over 18 because of this, as you can't get a contract for anything unless you are 18 or over. As well as this I am paying for this to view and browse the internet, why should I have to pay yet another fee to view a non-explicit page?!! - the filter is blocking a fanfiction page that is suitable for people under 18.
Unfortunately this is another reason why I am seriously considering not renewing my contract.

[Anonymous]

Every provider has age verification, though some may handle it better than others. Everyone always makes the point about "they have my details on file and you have to be 18 to get a contract" is it really so hard to envisage a situation where a contract phone is given to a child to use? There is no way to see who is using a phone except by verification. It's not fool proof, and o2 seems to have found the clumsiest way to do it, but thats the reason anyway

[Anonymous]

The point you're missing, Beaufighter, is that O2 should have absolutely no hand in what I browse on the Internet. The fact they're blocking sites like translate.google.com drives home the banality of it.
I've been on my o2 contract since June and today is the first time this has happened. They expect me to go out of my way, all of a sudden, to remove some bullshit block that wasn't there in the first place? And charge me.
Then, to top it all off, the site's been hammered so much by traffic that the server has died.
It's inexcusable.
So please, stop your sycophantic pandering posts, you cannot explain away o2's insane new policy.

[Anonymous]

The point you're missing, Beaufighter, is that O2 should have absolutely no hand in what I browse on the Internet. The fact they're blocking sites like translate.google.com drives home the banality of it.
I've been on my o2 contract since June and today is the first time this has happened. They expect me to go out of my way, all of a sudden, to remove some bullshit block that wasn't there in the first place? And charge me.
Then, to top it all off, the site's been hammered so much by traffic that the server has died.
It's inexcusable.
So please, stop your sycophantic pandering posts, you cannot explain away o2's insane new policy.

Couldn't have put it better myself.

[Anonymous]

Kael13- I totally agree! We are paying for a service to use as we see fit. I've been on my broadband contract since aug09 and I have never seen a message like this before and on top of that I have no credit cards so will have to go completly out of my way to go to an o2 shop to get both my phone and broadband unblocked.

[Anonymous]

I was redirected to Bango three times today asking for my credit card details and donation of £1 (for the privilege of confirming my age to a third party no doubt). I travelled 10 miles to my local O2 shop, where they denied knowing anything about Bango and told me to ring Customer Services, Customer Services said it was a glitch and were trying to sort it out, also they did not admit being in cahoots with Bango, I informed them that during my first 30 day refund promise this never happened so now I am on my 61st day I would like to return the dongle as internet access had been denied to me. The next step was to ask me to read my credit card details over the phone to O2 cust services, I refused so they relented and told me to give age verification to O2 shop manager,(he gave me a pin number, I do not know what for). Two hours after shop visit my internet connection is back to normal and faster.

[Anonymous]

Whenever I try to reply to this thread, O2 Mobile Broadband cuts off. Are they trying to tell me something?