Has Google become incredibly paranoid?

[Guiyon]

I don't know what's going on but for some reason Google reports every one of my search results as containing malware. This is when using Firefox 3.05 on Mac OS X 10.5.6; I get the same results in WebKit r40419 on the same system. Anyone else seeing this problem?

[Locker]

Don't know if this is happening globally, but all search results are currently being blocked by Google :eek:

It's insane:

http://img104.imageshack.us/img104/3167/picture40dn5.th.png (http://img104.imageshack.us/my.php?image=picture40dn5.png)

http://img204.imageshack.us/img204/8290/picture38vp5.th.png (http://img204.imageshack.us/my.php?image=picture38vp5.png)

[nick9191]

Yep, just happened to me as well.

[Peterkro]

Hmm,that be very odd.

[chilipie]

Doing the same for me.

S'weird that.

[myusername]

I've been on 3 computers and every search says this site may harm your computer, I tried my MacBook Pro 2 users and then ARD into my office machine and that one had the same results, can someone google a legit term, Apple, iPhone, Boston, anything and see if others have the same problem

This is so strange, every site listed has the same This site may harm your computer.

-r

[sheepopo39]

Whenever I open any page in Google I get a message this says this "website may harm your computer" and it happens with EVERY website, so does anybody know how to fix this problem, it can't be safari cause I've tried it with Minefield it still does the same thing and it happens on another mac, so it can't be the firewall.

Ignore this post, I'm gonna post this in the other news section

[RedTomato]

The Google machine seems to be throwing a sprocket today.

When you type in a search term, ALL results, even our own Macrumors.com, are labelled with 'This site may harm your computer'.

Clicking on any result link takes you to a highly scary page reading

Warning - visiting this web site may harm your computer!
Suggestions:

* Return to the previous page and pick another result.
* Try another search to find what you're looking for.

Or you can continue to http://macrumors.com at your own risk. For detailed information about the problems we found, visit Google's Safe Browsing diagnostic page for this site.

Note: no onward link is given to MacRumors. The user has to manually type in the link in the address bar if they want to come here. In the quote, it looks like it works - MR's forum software automatically makes it a working link. On the original page, it is a non-live link.

This is affecting Google.com, Google.co.uk, Google.com.au, so it seems global.

MRoogle is affected too - the links to the forum search results dump you on malware warning pages.

Even googling Google's own homepage results in a malware warning - Google will refuse to take you to its own homepage :D

Oh nooees teh internets is bjorked!11!

But my less techy partner is rather put out - she was unable to figure out how to continue to her desired page from the malware partner. Gentlemen and Gentlewomen of MR, expect a flood of calls from perplexed family members and workmates.

[panoz7]

Yep.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3088/3241484812_d04ffde4e3_o.jpg

[myusername]

Has google been hacked ?

[Stuipdboy1000]

It's doing the same with me too.

Very odd. Hope they manage to sort it soon.

[John Pryor]

I'm using safari and the same thing here for ALL my search results.

[aznguyen316]

It's doing the same with me too.

Very odd. Hope they manage to sort it soon.

WHEW, I just thought it was me.

[Yaris]

OMG yes. I thought there was something wrong with Safari because when I use Firefox there is nothing wrong but in safari any google search comes up with "this site may harm your computer".

[MST]

Same, at first I thought it may have been Firefox on my iMac playing up but then I tried using Safari on my iPhone and got exactly the same "this site may harm your computer" message under each of the search headers, anyone got any suggestions?

...:mad:

[myusername]

How do you contact google, or is this a wait and see what happens

[joelovesapple]

I thought I was the only one and was about to post here but then saw this thread.

I instantly started running Spybot on our PC just in case anything happened, but it's doing it on my mac. Google must be having problems at their end.

In reality, every site may harm your computer, as new threats are emerging all the time.

[hacksaw-C87]

All working fine with me...

How odd.

Probably just random maintenance work.

[Locker]

Probably just random maintenance work.
Gone wrong... :p

[sheepopo39]

Apparently that this is happening to like everyone. So whenever you click on a link in Google, it gives you that page saying "this page may harm your computer", and I mean EVERY page. So don't you guys think its odd for a big company like google to have a glitch like this?

[Yaris]

Again, let me say that google search on Firefox for me is PERFECTLY FINE. But when I use Safari all google results say that "this site may harm your computer".

Also:
http://search.twitter.com/search?q=google

[metroid87706]

Google may harm my computer? Haha.

[izibo]

Whenever I open any page in Google I get a message this says this "website may harm your computer" and it happens with EVERY website, so does anybody know how to fix this problem, it can't be safari cause I've tried it with Minefield it still does the same thing and it happens on another mac, so it can't be the firewall.

Ignore this post, I'm gonna post this in the other news section

Ditto, I think their malware identification server is down. The system must be defaulted to block access unless it can identify it as a clean site.

[cfs]

Hello Forum,

Starting about ten minutes ago when I use safari or Firefox and type in a search in their spotlight, every result on Google reads, "This site may harm your computer." I mean every result like MacRumors, Yahoo, Google, New York Times, Best Buy, Schools, etc.

However, when I search on yahoo it is fine?

Is this a Google issue or my imac?

Thanks.

[Slash1959]

happening on both safari and firefox here....:eek:

[joelovesapple]

Very wrong.:D

[myusername]

I just tried FireFox and it's happening on both FireFox and Safari.

[knarzie]

yep. came here hoping to find some answers.

[Guiyon]

Looks like it just popped up on Slashdot (Google Search Flagging Everything As Potentially Harmful (http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/01/31/1457221)). It's nice to know I wasn't hallucinating :)

[bigandy]

Of course it's gonna happen on both Safari and Firefox. It's a Google issue, not a browser issue.

*facepalm*



They probably got drunk before the latest round of coding and flicked the wrong switch. It'll be fixed in no time.

[Winglet]

Me too. I was thinking I was losing it as well.

[rdowns]

Was just about to start a thread on this.

[Dagless]

Yep.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3088/3241484812_d04ffde4e3_o.jpg

Don't Google Google! Did the IT Crowd teach you nothing?

[stukdog]

I'm glad you took the time to write this. It was happening on every search I did and it was driving me nuts.

(Of course, the first thing I did was search Google to see if it was happening to anyone else. Talk about an infinite loop of warnings. I finally went to Yahoo.com and did my first search ever on the site.)

[benthewraith]

Ditto, I think their malware identification server is down. The system must be defaulted to block access unless it can identify it as a clean site.

Its the end of Google as we know it. And I feel fine.

[sheepopo39]

Or maybe somebody hacked them? But you would think that they are secure enough to not have that happen

[tigres]

Yeah, this has been happening for almost an hour.

Google's been jacked? Honestly I have never seen this type of problem with Google before.

hmmm

[panoz7]

Don't Google Google! Did the IT Crowd teach you nothing?

But I like going around in circles.

[HaroldC]

What is this????? Has Google gone crazy? Every site is now blocked. Even my own site that I manage! And when I try to access the webmaster tools, I get a '502 service error'.

If they don't fix this quickly, people are going to use another search engine. I know I need to now.....

[myusername]

Why ? Yaris was saying it was working fine on FireFox and just Safari was the problem, 2 of us confirmed it was on both browsers being talked about.

-r

[tigres]

Was just about to start a thread on this.

Off topic for just a moment.

What program do you utilize to preform that edit on the Google page with the arrows?

Thanks in advance.

On topic.

[Truz21]

I'm glad you wrote this up, I was afraid it was some sort of security problem on my end.

What will I do without google!

[paulyonder]

Hello Forum,

Starting about ten minutes ago when I use safari or Firefox and type in a search in their spotlight, every result on Google reads, "This site may harm your computer." I mean every result like MacRumors, Yahoo, Google, New York Times, Best Buy, Schools, etc.

However, when I search on yahoo it is fine?

Is this a Google issue or my imac?

Thanks.

Nope, not just you, google is officially catastrophically busted. Check out news stories via google search, its happened world-wide.

Who left the intern working at Google HQ over the weekend....

[rdowns]

Off topic for just a moment.

What program do you utilize to preform that edit on the Google page with the arrows?

Thanks in advance.

On topic.


http://skitch.com/

[stukdog]

Interestingly, if you search on Mobile Safari on the iPhone, the results return ok.

[benthewraith]

All is good again. Google is fixed. We may now go back to Googling.

EDIT: Never mind. It was and then it went back again.

[sheepopo39]

A lot of the links now are working but a few still aren't working like epocrates which is medical software I need

[Loccy]

Had the same problem as well, which was very LOLworthy. Particularly to do the below demotivational:

http://www.catsthatlooklikehitler.com/microsoft-demot.jpg

[Slash1959]

Google appears to be implementing an anti-malware feature that would scan URL's of sites that you search for within their search engine. If a site is found to contain malware, a link would be presented under the search results for that site indicating so. Apparently, they are testing the new feature today and while I was searching I found that everything I searched for said it had malware, which is obviously not the case. However, it is interesting to note that Google is implementing this feature, a feature that Yahoo has had for sometime now.

source: http://techfragments.com/news/353/Tech/Google_Implementing_Anti-Malware_Feature_in_Search_Results.html

[bigandy]

rdowns pointed you to a thread that had been created earlier about this issue, did you really need to carry on bumping your own? :p

[panoz7]

What program do you utilize to preform that edit on the Google page with the arrows?


I'm really glad nobody told you to google it.

[bigandy]

Some people seem to be having issues figuring out how to work around the issue.

Just take the following part out of the URL it lands on:

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

;)

[velocityg4]

I have been getting this too. However if you do a Google search through the Firefox Google (http://www.google.com/firefox?client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official) start page everything is fine. It seems to be the main Google pages are screwed up.

[tigres]

I'm really glad nobody told you to google it.


I was actually waiting for the first smart *** to go there, I left myself wide open on that one. :D

[air-ick]

This is a huge screw up by google. my mom called and asked what she should do. i had her type yahoo.com in the browser and save it as her default page. she probably won't change it - lost business for google - i'm sure she's not the only one.

Eric

[rdowns]

I was actually waiting for the first smart *** to go there, I left myself wide open on that one. :D

I must admit, I was tempted. :D

[JNB]

Yup, just encountered this in the last five minutes. Googling for Apple, Dell, and Microsoft were fine, but then MR and "Camera" return universally the error. Seems lik it's entirely on Google's side, and not browser or ISP specific.

[tigres]

I must admit, I was tempted. :D


It's fixed folks... try google now

[cfs]

thanks. good to know.

[air-ick]

It's fixed now.

Eric

[sheepopo39]

This WOULD happen to Google

[G.T.]

Sorry guys but I had to prove once and for all that typing google into google does break the internet. :p.

[joelovesapple]

Thank GOD for that!

[Blakely028]

Ha, this is quite weird. Thought it was just me until I saw this thread :rolleyes:

Even Google Mail is at it! I can't look at images in my emails because it tells me that the emailer might not be the real person! Hahaha

[RedTomato]

Here's the explanation from Google's official blog:

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/01/this-site-may-harm-your-computer-on.html

Basically someone typed a single wrong character on a single line in an update file that was sent to Google's malware utility. This effectively took down the internet for millions of people across the world, as well as disrupting Gmail and other Google services for millions of accounts.

It's become global news.

"This site may harm your computer" on every search result?!?!

1/31/2009 09:02:00 AM

If you did a Google search between 6:30 a.m. PST and 7:25 a.m. PST this morning, you likely saw that the message "This site may harm your computer" accompanied each and every search result. This was clearly an error, and we are very sorry for the inconvenience caused to our users.

What happened? Very simply, human error. Google flags search results with the message "This site may harm your computer" if the site is known to install malicious software in the background or otherwise surreptitiously. We do this to protect our users against visiting sites that could harm their computers. We maintain a list of such sites through both manual and automated methods. We work with a non-profit called StopBadware.org to come up with criteria for maintaining this list, and to provide simple processes for webmasters to remove their site from the list.

We periodically update that list and released one such update to the site this morning. Unfortunately (and here's the human error), the URL of '/' was mistakenly checked in as a value to the file and '/' expands to all URLs. Fortunately, our on-call site reliability team found the problem quickly and reverted the file. Since we push these updates in a staggered and rolling fashion, the errors began appearing between 6:27 a.m. and 6:40 a.m. and began disappearing between 7:10 and 7:25 a.m., so the duration of the problem for any particular user was approximately 40 minutes.

Thanks to our team for their quick work in finding this. And again, our apologies to any of you who were inconvenienced this morning, and to site owners whose pages were incorrectly labelled. We will carefully investigate this incident and put more robust file checks in place to prevent it from happening again.

Thanks for your understanding.

Update at 10:29 am PST: This post was revised as more precise information became available (changes are in blue). Here's StopBadware's explanation.

Posted by Marissa Mayer, VP, Search Products & User Experience

[liptonlover]

I'm absolutely fine... I tried with opera and safari, neither gave me a warning.

[michaelsviews]

Here's the explanation from Google's official blog:

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/01/this-site-may-harm-your-computer-on.html

Basically someone typed a single wrong character on a single line in an update file that was sent to Google's malware utility. This effectively took down the internet for millions of people across the world, as well as disrupting Gmail and other Google services for millions of accounts.

It's become global news.

Hey Sh_t happens , its called human error, and I applaud Google for the above mentioned.

[liptonlover]

... or.... google just doesn't want to admit they got hacked. :rolleyes: