Google Now Warns Malware Infected Computers

[nsane.forums]

Google has started warning some search users of malware on their computers, after it found unusual search traffic coming through a small number of intermediary servers called proxies.The company said in a post on its online security blog that the particular malware causes infected computers to send traffic to Google through the proxies.

Google is putting up a notification at the top of Google web search results to users whose traffic is coming through the proxies. The notice warns uses that their computer is infected with software that intercepts their connection with Google and other sites, Damian Menscher , a Google security engineer said in the post.

Google hopes to work with users to help them update their antivirus software and remove the infections.

"I think what Google is doing should be applauded, as anything which warns computer users about genuine malware threats has to be a good thing," said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at security firm Sophos."But, sadly and inevitably, there is the potential for cybercriminals to mimic the Google warning and direct users to dangerous downloads," Cluley said.

However, that alone shouldn't discourage Google from warning its users when it believes it has identified a security problem, he said.

Google said it found the unusual search traffic while doing routine maintenance on one of its data centers. After collaborating with security engineers at several companies that were sending the modified traffic, Google determined that the computers exhibiting this behavior were infected with a particular strain of malware.

Menscher did not provide details on the malware.

View: Original Article

[madeinheaven]

Google Now Warns Malware Infected Computers

The big G added another helpful feature to “Google search”, today Google announced that from now on-wards Google will tell you whether your PC has been infected from malware or not.

Users from malware infected computers when performed a search on Google will notice a large yellow box on the top of the screen telling you that “Your computer appears to be infected”, if you see the message, you need to clean up the infection from your machine.

Recently Google found some unusual search traffic while performing routine maintenance on one of their data centers. After collaborating with security engineers at several companies, it determined that the computers exhibiting this behavior were infected with a particular strain of malicious software, or “malware.” As a result of this discovery, today some people will see a prominent notification at the top of their Google web search results.

This particular malware causes infected computers to send traffic to Google through a small number of intermediary servers called “proxies.” We hope that by taking steps to notify users whose traffic is coming through these proxies, we can help them update their antivirus software and remove the infections.

Google said “In case our notice doesn’t reach everyone directly, you can run a system scan on your computer yourself by following the steps in Help Center article.”

According to Matt Cutts this malware driven traffic is specific to Windows and google is trying this as an experiment to alert and protect consumers from malware infection.

But I have to remind you that it is not possible for google to detect all types of viruses and malware, so its your duty to keep your computer clean.I would recommend you to use Microsoft Security Essentials which has top rated Antivirus engine and more over it is free.

Source: techno360.in

[DKT27]

Staff Note: Threads merged. :)