Bing has been serving up malicious Google Chrome ads for months • Hacker News Board

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

#131

Post by pishpash » Sun, Oct 28, 2018, 1:13 AM UTC

wtracy wrote: post #105

azifali wrote: 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.

Given the cutthroat short term metrics these companies' employees operate under, do you really think such strategic thinking would have ever been incentivized? It's a question whether any salutary effects can even be reliably defined and measured to justify such a project to your boss.

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

#132

Post by sp332 » Sun, Oct 28, 2018, 1:23 AM UTC

bhauer wrote: post #129

EpicEng wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was a short time about seven years ago when Google was returning a malicious link for Blizard's BattleNet. Had my WoW creds stolen and I wasn't what you would call naive on a computer.

That sucks. I know it's a tired point, but it nevertheless amuses me that someone would search for BattleNet. The name is literally the domain name: battle.net.

Ok but there's no way to know that without searching. Unless you have one of these https://mobile.twitter.com/PulpLibrarian/status/844278365590...

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

#133

Post by jamieweb » Sun, Oct 28, 2018, 1:38 AM UTC

Dylan16807 wrote: post #130

partiallypro wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I mean obviously what the average users wants it to have to type in apt get commands and finding the slug to get the right package instead of clicking a link. Very intuitive. You know how Google & Firefox could easily help fix this? List their browsers in the Mac and Windows Store.

Browsers are banned from the Windows Store. For 'security' reasons. It's tricky to get win32 apps in general into it, too.

Is that the same for the Mac App Store? Looks like browsers aren't in there either.

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

#134

Post by variable11 » Sun, Oct 28, 2018, 1:39 AM UTC

simongr3dal wrote: post #58

I never quite understood the appeal of giving some unknown third-party the right to put links and text and javascript onto your site. It might be labour intensive to have human eyes on every ad that is sold when you're at Google, or even Bing, scale. But it seems a little bit too hands-off, and irresponsible, to take money without vetting the input and then letting every scammer get into that very "blessed" and visib…

TV, radio, and newspapers earn money through ad revenue and are regulated so that the ads they run are not blatant scams or criminal enterprises--the gray area of escort ads aside.

Google and others makes most of its money through ad revenue, they need to be regulated like a media property.

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

#135

Post by gpm » Sun, Oct 28, 2018, 1:45 AM UTC

sp332 wrote: post #132

bhauer wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That sucks. I know it's a tired point, but it nevertheless amuses me that someone would search for BattleNet. The name is literally the domain name: battle.net.

Ok but there's no way to know that without searching. Unless you have one of these https://mobile.twitter.com/PulpLibrarian/status/844278365590...

I mean, you could guess. The name even hints at it for anyone aware of the `.net` tld.

That's not a great solution, since many people are barely aware what at url is, but I think it should still be one that you and I (as people who are) use.

Similarly the article is fixed by guessing that google chrome is probably at chrome.google.com (also chrome.com), firefox is probably at firefox.com, cnn is probably at cnn.com, gmail is probably at mail.google.com, gmail.google.com, or gmail.com (actually all 3), hacker news is probably at hackernews.com (oops), etc.

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

#136

Post by w7 » Sun, Oct 28, 2018, 1:47 AM UTC

gpm wrote: post #128

saagarjha wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would Microsoft do this?

I'm really not clear why they don't. Apart from driving traffic to bing, what advantage do they gain by developing edge? How does edge drive more traffic than a customized firefox? The only thing plausible thing I can think of is hoping to execute another round of embrace extend extinguish on the web, putting other desktop operating systems at a disadvantage. With google chrome's dominance that seems unlikely to work…

Besides being a stepping-stone to the desire for full vertical control of the user experience Edge components are also integrated into other portions of Windows. This is similar to the situation with Internet Explorer.

If I recall correctly UWP uses Edge's rendering engine (EdgeHTML) and JavaScript engine (Chakra). Edge integration/embeddability is also available to Win32/WPF/WinForms applications past a certain Windows 10 version. It makes some sense for them to develop something they have full control over if they use its technology in other core components/libraries of their operating system.

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

#137

Post by rietta » Sun, Oct 28, 2018, 1:47 AM UTC

wtracy wrote: post #103

beagle3 wrote: 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.

You mean like download a browser from the Windows AppStore of vetted signed apps?

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

#138

Post by sneak » Sun, Oct 28, 2018, 1:48 AM UTC

EpicEng wrote: post #122

the_clarence wrote: post #115

FWIW Google also returns malicious chrome ads. My father had a brand new laptop and the first thing he did was to google chrome. He got a bunch or malware by clicking on the first link.

There was a short time about seven years ago when Google was returning a malicious link for Blizard's BattleNet. Had my WoW creds stolen and I wasn't what you would call naive on a computer.

It is important to remember that phishing works against even experienced and savvy users who know about phishing, and that effective countermeasures for these types of attacks do not include “replace users with smarter users”.

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

#139

Post by userbinator » Sun, Oct 28, 2018, 1:49 AM UTC

AzzieElbab wrote: post #112

Bing is likely to return spam and scams on any search. There is no conspiracy against Chrome.

Incidentally, the relative lack of filtering/censorship also means I've had far more luck "Binging" obscure/fringe/questionable-content sites than with Google. I suppose them receiving fewer DMCA takedowns also contributes.

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

#140

Post by paulie_a » Sun, Oct 28, 2018, 2:02 AM UTC

tgsovlerkhgsel wrote: post #104

paulie_a wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

I should start doing that. I do occasionally fill out the stupid lengthy third party form sites use. It has a red logo, I forget the name of it. But in the free form comment section I explain how obnoxious it is. Also that company will hopefully go bankrupt asap.