Typo Sees Google Flag Every Website as Malicious

By Greg McNevin

February 2, 2009: If you were using Google search between 6:30 a.m. PST and 7:25 a.m. PST, then chances are you would have noticed that every Google search result contained warnings of malware, but fear not, according to Google an errant forward slash and not suspicious activity is to blame.

Google says that the error effected users for around 40 minutes on Saturday, when a misplaced character in its malware listing caused the entire internet to be listed as potentially harmful.

The search colossus works with the non-profit called StopBadware.org to construct a list of risky sites, periodically updating its engine with the latest list so users can be given warned if a particular site harbours potentially dangerous software.

“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,” writes Marissa Mayer, VP, Search Products & User Experience on the official Google blog. “We do this to protect our users against visiting sites that could harm their computers.

Mayer adds that due to human error, the URL of '/' was accidentally included as a value to the file, and '/' expands the list to include all URLs.

She says that the accident will be thoroughly investigated with further checks put in place to ensure it cannot happen again.

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