July 21, 2011
Thanks a lot Google
Saw this story circulating tonight.
Google search: now with malware warnings
Google search: now with malware warnings
Google has activated a scheme which will see users warned if their Windows systems appear to have a particular type of malware. The warning "Your computer appears to be infected" will be displayed at the top of search results when Google detects that the search query has arrived at their systems via a proxy which modifies the search requests.
Just dandy. I have spent, I don't know how long, trying to make people stop clicking on links that purport to tell them they have some kind of "infection". All the variants of Windows Defender and more recently Mac Defender will pop onto your screen and tell you to "click here" to find out how to fix it.
Now GOOGLE of all entities just adds to the general confusion by giving people a link to click to "learn how to fix this".
I'll cut straight to the point - Google - you are MORONS! Thanks so much for muddying the waters because you saw some malware pointers. The problem is, the average users can NOT tell the difference between your half hearted baked effort to inform them of a problem and real malware.
This is idiocy taken to a whole new level. Especially when you find the link doesn't even give these poor people any decent information on how to get rid of the malware.
Geeze Google - just cut to the chase and hand out the malware yourself as they do the searches. It's easier that way.
BAH!
Posted by: Teresa in
Idiocies
at
10:39 PM
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Oh no...
Posted by: vwbug at July 22, 2011 01:13 PM (FPOeI)
2
The funny thing is, I just heard a security podcast and they really liked what Google has done. I'm going to take a wild guess and say they don't deal with "regular" users very often. Honestly it's enough to make me go bang my head against a wall.
I've dealt with enough everyday users (the ones who tend to get malware because they don't know they shouldn't click things). They are not going to know the difference. Really they aren't. They still believe that Microsoft will email them to tell them they have a system problem. So this puts the process of trying to get them NOT to click on things all the way back to 1000 feet behind the starting line... because now you have a "company" with a name giving them a link to click to "fix" the problem.
And, better yet, what happens when the bad guys spoof the google malware warning page.
I've dealt with enough everyday users (the ones who tend to get malware because they don't know they shouldn't click things). They are not going to know the difference. Really they aren't. They still believe that Microsoft will email them to tell them they have a system problem. So this puts the process of trying to get them NOT to click on things all the way back to 1000 feet behind the starting line... because now you have a "company" with a name giving them a link to click to "fix" the problem.
And, better yet, what happens when the bad guys spoof the google malware warning page.
Posted by: Teresa at July 22, 2011 03:44 PM (xE2iU)
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