What is up with Google

[cgarison]

Looks like something is wrong with Google this morning.

All the results are pulling pages like this:

http://www.google.com/interstitial?url= ... icles.com/

I am pretty sure Ford is not going to harm my PC with malware on their website. All other searches are yielding the same results.

[Arp2]

That wasn't the case for me, but, uh......

....um, did you just link us to malware???


Should we maybe remove that link....?

[CoolBreeze]

Over the last couple of months I've noticed that (depending on the search) a full 50% of the search results can be malware.

For instance, search "Wesvin Inc" (the company that owned the plane that crashed in Huntington) and then eliminate the news article about it... and what you're left with is about 50% malware.

Today, I actually caught the "FakeAlert" Trojan from one of those websites. It is considered to be the largest pain-in-the-ass malware ever produced. It CAN be a real threat to you. It then proceeded to completely take-over both Firefox and IE browsers. At the same time, it continued to pop-up a Microsoft-looking window advising me to download a "fix". Hell, anyone with half a brain is on to THAT old trick. So while I had a virus, it wasn't anything serious as far as information compromise. Had I download the "fix", things would have seriously escalated. Once you've been infected with part 1 of this virus, it disables most all anti-virus protections you may have. It also prevent you from going to any website where you might find a removal tool. So your only option (for most people anyway) is to get on another computer and download a removal tool and then install it in the affected computer.

The point of all this is the following: I've noticed a pattern in these malware sites. For one, the URL is nothing you've ever heard of. Also, it often times is a scramble of letters that don't even make sense. Finally, the short text preview of the site (on Google search) often doesn't make any sense at all if you read it.

Back to the posters comment:

Published: January 31, 2009

Google’s Internet search service malfunctioned for nearly 55 minutes Saturday morning, upending users around the world with search results that carried false safety warnings and Web links that did not work.

The company acknowledged Saturday that all searches produced links with the same warning message: “This site may harm your computer.” Clicking on any of the links led to an error message stating that the desired site could not be reached.

“What happened?” Google explained in its blog. “Very simply, human error.”

Google said it periodically updates its list of sites suspected of carrying dangerous software that could harm computers, and that Saturday morning a Google employee mistyped a Web address for one such site, causing all sites to be flagged harmful.

There was some momentary tension when Google seemed to imply that the glitch was caused by StopBadware.org, the company that helps Google determine which sites are unsafe. Google later posted a statement that took the blame for the error.

“We have a good ongoing relationship with StopBadware.org,” a Google spokesman, Gabriel Stricker, said in a telephone interview. “In our post, we tried to clarify our role in this error.”

Google is not known for glitches, but there have been other recent ones. Google Maps had a software glitch last month that sent drivers trying to get to different points within Staten Island, specifically zip codes 10302 and 10308, on a 176-mile detour to Schenectady instead.

The glitches in Google Maps and Google search were unrelated, Mr. Stricker said. As for Saturday’s search engine failure, he added: “Our Web search is extremely reliable, and that’s why when an interruption occurs, even if it’s for a matter of minutes, for a Saturday morning, people notice it.”