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Anduril Service
Anduril services for MSN TV 2 are entirely web-based, utilizing a number of ASPX web services and standard web technologies (HTML, JavaScript, XML, AJAX) to provide services and content to MSN TV 2 subscribers. Some of these services utilized proprietary MSN TV ActiveX controls to communicate directly with the box, most of which remain undocumented.
Almost all of these services were hosted on the SG servers (sgN[.trusted].msntv.msn.com), and it is known that the login services were also hosted on the headwaiter servers. Mail services were hosted on a separate mail-sgN.msntv.msn.com domain. It is known that sync-sgN.trusted.msntv.msn.com domains were also registered, but what purpose they served is currently unclear.
Some of these services, such as login and mail check, operate more discretely and in an unorthodox manner. These services would be contacted from a special off-screen "panel" in the MSN TV 2 browser when it needed to contact them. Panels are the equivalent of browser frames used by the MSN TV 2 browser to load HTML files or web pages as separate windows, and on boot up, an invisible panel named service is created that is used exclusively for Anduril service communication.
Once the servers received a request for these services, they would either respond with an error code if something went wrong, or send back a fragment of JavaScript meant to be executed locally in the service panel, which would directly control the box and tell it what to do. This was primarily done through the previously mentioned ActiveX controls specifically made for the MSN TV 2 firmware. While this would otherwise be a giant security concern, the firmware's WinCE registry was designed to only allow HTTPS subdomains under *.trusted.msntv.msn.com to have the necessary privileges to run those scripts remotely.
Before any service script can run, the MSN TV 2 browser application will check if it contains any text. If it does, then it will immediately terminate the script from running and write its contents to the main panel.