Google Badware?

[evilfantasy]

I just did a search on google and there were new little warnings under some of the results.
This Site May Harm Your Computer

I know just entering the site would not hurt so I clicked it and was taken to this.
www.stopbadware.org
So is google now redirecting our searches just like the malware they warn about?
It actually won't let me in!

http://i154.photobucket.com/albums/s258/evilfantasy69/Badware.jpg

[Adrynalyne]

google is preventing you from viewing a page thats been reported to contain mailicious software.

Are they redirecting your searches? No, they are doing their part in trying to slow down the malware threat.

[evilfantasy]

I get what they are doing. I have never seen this or thought they would block access through their searches. I saw the warning. It just strikes me as odd.

[Adrynalyne]

I first saw it something like a year ago when it was a trial run. Guess they are going through with it.

[evilfantasy]

I just saw a post over at Piriform that showed them flagged.
Google "New GUI for JK Defrag" and they are the first hit and flagged as Badware.

[Adrynalyne]

Well, that was sort of my concern when I found out they were 'voting' on sites to ban with user complaints.

We all know those users who get infected, think they are smart enough to figure out which site infected them, and then bitch and whine.

If those people were to complain to the above site, and nobody was properly checking out these sites to see if the claims were correct, yeah I could see a lot of bad things happening.

Wonder if thats what happened there.

[BILLMCC66]

Google is under pressure to get it's house in order regarding privacy and i can only think this is a spin off from that!!!

http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=55314

http://img300.imageshack.us/img300/9951/google96b491zk0.th.jpg (http://img300.imageshack.us/my.php?image=google96b491zk0.jpg)

[LauraR]

Considering the fact that 99% of people are ignorant or stupid, or both, in their surfing habits, it could be a very good thing. If google is going by people's votes as adryn says, that would be a bit scary since those same ignorant people would be doing the voting.

[evilfantasy]

The site I mentioned are the forums for CCleaner.

So yes, ignorance will show itself from time to time in this new addition.

[Halo]

If voting is being used then this is a bad route to take, just as some sites get flagged as bad in McAfees Site Advisor... way way too open to abuse in wrongly flagging a site up as in Piriforms Forum and the thread and links in Evilfantasys link to a thread has nothing bad in it!

While I think their rationale is in the right area to help stop some users searching and clicking a wrong link and being infected with malware from an infected site or a download from said site, the pitfall is who is determining what is bad or not, if by votes a site is added to this list then thats not good.

[LauraR]

I just did a google search for 'piriform forum' and clicked on it. It came up fine for me evil.

[Adrynalyne]

I had the same problem, using his parameters. Its a particular post being flagged.

[Halo]

I just did a google search for 'piriform forum' and clicked on it. It came up fine for me evil.

Laura, what you need to do is to copy this New GUI for JK Defrag into Google and click search, the forum thread that is listed first in the search, links to a Piriform Forum thread and thats what is blocked.

[evilfantasy]

I just saw a post over at Piriform that showed them flagged.
Google "New GUI for JK Defrag" and they are the first hit and flagged as Badware.

You have to google the phrase I mentined. JK Defrag has nothing to do with Piriform as far as I know besides mentioning it in a post. But they show first on the list in the search and have the This Site May.......

Piriform is not a download site. Even for CCleaner they will send users to other sites to download the program.

[LauraR]

doh!

Missed that...yep, it came up.

[augiedoggie]

Interesting as I've never heard about this or just plain don't remember. At least they provide the offending URL if one wants to go there anyway.

[Halo]

Piriform do host CCleaner on their site in the alternative download option.

But would love to know the reason that thread on JK Defrag was highlighted as bad as the links in that thread were to a dutch site for a GUI which is not malware and to a listing for ScanDefrag which actually links to a Majorgeeks download page for that app, which is also legit.

Seems that this content filtering is flawed or not without some major issues concerning false positives.

[augiedoggie]

Ya, makes one wonder what kind of quality assurance, if any, do they have.

[musksnipe]

There is a link posted in the thread that the Google supplied URL takes you to, if you choose to continue on....It may be the link in the thread that is malicious. It goes to emro.nl/freeware and we all know what can happen downloading freeware from some off-the-wall site.

[evilfantasy]

McAfee Site Advisor has an All Green Rating (http://www.siteadvisor.com/sites/emro.nl?ref=safe&client_ver=FF_26.5_6172&locale=en-US&premium=false&client_type=FF&aff_id=0) for them.

.nl is a Nederlands based site.

[musksnipe]

:confusedYou got me, evil. This watchdog warning is basically for novices anyway. Regular users of the 'net should have developed good surfing habits and if they haven't are probably waiting on answers in some malware forum.
Even my wife, who tends not to listen to most things I tell her, rolleyes heeds the warnings about clicking on strange pop-ups, redirected pages, or emails from strangers. And she never downloads some program because a message tells her she is infected. I am actually pretty proud that she has never been infected.
Now if I could get her to keep from forwarding them stupid chain letters to me. LOL

[evilfantasy]

Don't tell my Mom but I have nearly put her on my spam list more then once.rolleyes I can't stand the chain mails either. Not even from loved ones.

Sorry Mom.:D