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Bing has been serving up malicious Google Chrome ads for months

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Re: Bing has been serving up malicious Google Chrome ads for months

#101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>If you have a new Windows 10 PC and want to download Chrome, how else could you do it besides "using Microsoft Edge to download Chrome"? Use Edge to download Firefox, and Firefox to download Chrome ;)

Just use ninite https://ninite.com/

How would I download this, without using Bing in Edge to download the installer for this?

Re: Bing has been serving up malicious Google Chrome ads for months

#102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ad-supported software has ads. No liking the ads and refusing to pay for the product isn't a grand moral stand.

This isn’t the same thing. Some people are happy with viewing ads in general, but are not happy with aggressive pop-ups that tell them to upgrad. In essence these alerts are saying their choice is the wrong one, even though it’s a choice that YouTube itself gave them.

More specifically: "good" ads aren't modal and don't force you to click through to continue. If YouTube just mixed YouTube Red ads in with all their other ads, I doubt that anyone would be complaining. (Except for the people who want everything to be free without any ads.)

Re: Bing has been serving up malicious Google Chrome ads for months

#103
post #51

.. and that's why running an ad-blocker these days is not even a moral question; It's proper hygiene. I don't eat without washing my hands first, and I don't browse without an ad blocker.

In this instance, that just ads one more level of convolution to the situation without addressing the fundamental issue.

If you get ads for a malicious version of a browser on a new PC, why isn't it possible to get ads for a malicious version of an ad blocker?

There's no end to this rabbit hole unless you can acquire the software without the use of a search engine, or the search engine cleans up its act.

Re: Bing has been serving up malicious Google Chrome ads for months

#104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a tangent/pile-on, but this is not the only dark pattern google engages in. I absolutely do not want YouTube Red. Any software that respects the user would let you dismiss the offer with an option for “do not ask me again.” And yet, because the software is not respecting the user, YouTube asks me ad nauseum if I want to upgrade to YouTube Red. No. I do not. But I don’t get an option for no. There is something…

YouTube red spam is obnoxious. Same with apps that ask for a review and the options are "not now, or not right now" I'm never going to leave a review.

Funny, when an app is obnoxious about asking for a review, I always oblige.

My review will of course focus mostly on my most recent experience with the app, which was "getting annoyed with an obnoxious pop-up". I hope that this discourages app authors from doing that.

Re: Bing has been serving up malicious Google Chrome ads for months

#105
post #99

Unfortunately the problem is not with Bing alone. There are multiple ad networks including admob owned by google, who will serve a url, or sometimes a script for an ad. That is unfortunately just how advertising works. The industry never matured (to handle spam, malicious content or fraud) thanks to the Duopoly of Fb and Google, and even the biggest players are not immune to these issues as the onus is on the user to…

Ironically, this should have been an opportunity for Bing to differentiate themselves:

Create a "safe" ad network that is not a vector for drive-by downloads or privacy violations, and go after publishers that are being hurt by ad blockers or experiencing reputation damage from security breaches.

Re: Bing has been serving up malicious Google Chrome ads for months

#106
post #18

The title of this article is deceptive clickbait.[1] The problem has nothing to do with the Edge browser, it has to do with search results returned by Bing, which happens to be Edge's default search engine. If you have a new Windows 10 PC and want to download Chrome, how else could you do it besides "using Microsoft Edge to download Chrome"? So "stop using Edge to download Chrome" is not useful advice. Better advice…

> And the problem seems to have been fixed. When I search for chrome download on Bing, the top result is https://www.google.com/chrome . Which could be faked, as seen in the referenced tweet: https://twitter.com/GabrielLandau/status/1055300918101598208 Yes, they show the word "Ad", alongside the domain name "google.com" - except the user doesn't end up on "google.com".

Oh, yes, its "fixed". Like the nice shiny buttons, which allow to set my windows privacy settings, fixing all my problems. Its of course not a fixed fix, meaning, it will be reseted the next time i download a update. So sloppy, im sure somebody is terribly sorry.

Its a miracle how bad a OS can go, that holds all of legacy hostage. If there ever is a standard for future project, there is a dire need for a interface layer, that allows to emulate every OS functionality and sunset the whole win32 ecosystem within some decades.

Re: Bing has been serving up malicious Google Chrome ads for months

#107
post #89

Explanation for the spoofed domain name: https://twitter.com/sephr/status/1055751684146655232 Bing can easily fix this domain spoofing vulnerability. I've reported this vulnerability to MSRC previously but received no response. This is also why open redirects can be so dangerous. Even if this domain spoofing vulnerability is fixed on Bing's end attackers can abuse open redirects to achieve the same result.

I don't think they will fix the underlying issue now. I've had the same issue ( literally trying to download chrome) in 2014. Now that they have public pushback they will fix just this ad placement.

I wonder what makes them think this is acceptable.

Re: Bing has been serving up malicious Google Chrome ads for months

#109
post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not a fan of the tactic either but MS does the same thing all the time. Also FF, Chrome and Safari ARE upgrades to Edge/IE by any reasonable metric. You've probably never had to write a non-trivial cross browser app. Try it and then let's see how you feel.

Yeah, picking on the upgrade wording is tricky, and cuts both ways. It has a common, semi-specific meaning with computers, but has also been used for far longer in the more general way it's used here. If you say "I upgraded my stereo system", I would consider the chance you meant that to imply you got better versions of the same devices from the same manufacturer to be essentially nil. I'm that respect, it may seem m…

If you said you upgraded your stereo, though, I’d expect you bought something pretty clearly nicer, eg by moving from a pair of PC speakers to a professional hifi. I wouldn’t expect that you’d have moved from one well-respected hifi manufacturer to another with different tradeoffs. Admittedly IE is pretty awful, but Chrome and FF are effectively comparable; “upgrade” is too strong a word for switching between them.

Re: Bing has been serving up malicious Google Chrome ads for months

#110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just use ninite https://ninite.com/

How would I download this, without using Bing in Edge to download the installer for this?

Just go to the site directly? You don't need to search for it.
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