Live data from Hacker News

Google Safe Browsing can kill a startup

gomox.medium.com

241–250 of 558 posts

Re: Google Safe Browsing can kill a startup

#241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What's most interesting is that the bucket is private, so the only way they could identify that there is something malicious at a URL is if someone downloads it using Chrome. I'm assuming they make this decision based on some database of checksums. Doesn't Chrome upload everything downloaded to VirusTotal (a Google product)?

The hashes of all things that match a "probably evil" bloom filter, yes. Hosting a virus on a domain and then downloading it a few times with different chrome installations sounds like a good way to get the whole domain blacklisted...

Why isn't Dropbox blacklisted? Too big?

Re: Google Safe Browsing can kill a startup

#243

“Don't host any customer generated data in your main domains. ” This is extremely important for multiple reasons. One reason is the blacklisting as mentioned in the article, the other reason is security: browser typically implement security policies around domains as well, such as cookie scoping and whatnot. Putting all user generated content under a completely separate domain avoids a whole category of potential iss…

For example, if someone manages to upload HTML and trick your system into serving it with a content type that browsers will interpret as HTML, then they can modify or exfiltrate your user's cookies. This could allow impersonation attacks, XSS, etc.

(Disclosure: I work for Google, speaking only for myself)

Re: Google Safe Browsing can kill a startup

#244

I can confirm everything that was said in that article. I run a free dynamic dns service (freemyip.com) and every time someone creates a subdomain that later hosts some questionable material, Google will immediately block my whole domain. Their response time for clearing these up varies from a few hours to two weeks. It feels completely random. I once had a malicious subdomain that I removed within two hours, yet the…

Have you considered requesting that your domain be added to the public suffix list? https://publicsuffix.org/

If subdomains of your domain should be treated as independent sites, the public suffix list is (sadly) how you communicate that to browsers.

(Disclosure: I work for Google, speaking only for myself)

Re: Google Safe Browsing can kill a startup

#245

Our company [0] was also hit by this too. We receive email for our customers and a portion of that is spam (given the nature of email). Google decided out of the blue to mark our attachment S3 bucket as dangerous, because of one malicious file. What's most interesting is that the bucket is private, so the only way they could identify that there is something malicious at a URL is if someone downloads it using Chrome.…

> What's most interesting is that the bucket is private, so the only way they could identify that there is something malicious at a URL is if someone downloads it using Chrome. I'm assuming they make this decision based on some database of checksums. Doesn't Chrome upload everything downloaded to VirusTotal (a Google product)?

> Doesn't Chrome upload everything downloaded to VirusTotal (a Google product)?

It doesn't, unless you opt for SafeSearch "Enhanced Protection" or enable "Help improve security on the web for everyone" in "Standard Protection". Both are off by default, IIRC. Without it, it periodically downloads what amounts to bloom filter of "potentially unsafe" URLs/domains.

On the other hand, GMail and GDrive do run the checks via VirusTotal, as far as we know - which means that OP case may have been caused by having some of the recipients having their incoming mail automatically scanned. It's similar for Microsoft version (FOPE users provide input for Defender Smart Screen), at least last time I checked.

Re: Google Safe Browsing can kill a startup

#246
post #233

A bit of deception on how their site ended up on the block list. They strangely block out a part of their response, but we can see "was cleared", which sounds a lot like "the malware some nefarious agent put on my site was removed". How sites end up on the block list- -they host malware, either intentionally or because they were hacked. -they host a phishing site, either intentionally or because they were hacked. Pro…

Author here. I blocked the message in the screenshot because I narrated the first incident, but took screenshots during the second one, so the redacted part was referencing the first one in which, as described, our domain was cleared without actually doing anything. Protecting end users from nothing at all (like I said, there is no offending URL) is not more important than making sure Google doesn't literally gatekee…

I guess. Odds are that there was something, and you have every reason to state otherwise. You're really focused on the URL, but a whole domain will be tagged when random queries are met with content dispositions with malware, which can be automatically flagged by the search engine.

As an aside, your commentary about Google alerting to phishing emails seems like you're misunderstanding and trying to use this to further your "it's all random!" claims. They aren't flagging it because of the sender, but instead because the contents included a URL on the blacklist. Google re-scans and when they find URLs that are now blacklisted, they warn about Phishing. This isn't new and they've done it for years, and it seems pretty obvious and logical.

e.g. "That email you got a while back that claimed it's from the Netflix billing problem website is actually phishing. If you gave them details, that's a problem".

"Protecting end users from nothing at all (like I said, there is no offending URL) is not more important than making sure Google doesn't literally gatekeep the entire Internet"

This system protects countless people from malware and phishing daily. I have no reason to believe your particular claims about this (though I'm skeptical given that you are blocking details that would allow others -- such as Google -- to repudiate your claims. Why block the subdomain? If it hosts static resources, what's the concern?).

Re: Google Safe Browsing can kill a startup

#247

After years of seeing developments like this, getting worse and worse, it fills me with rage to think about how clearly nobody in power at Google cares. I naively used to think, "they probably don't realize what's happening and will fix it." I always try to give benefit of the doubt, especially having been on the other side so many times and seeing how 9 times out of 10 it's not malice, just incompetence, apathy, or…

Jon Williams, circa 1987, wrote a story of a far-flung humanity's future in "Dinosaurs," in which humans had been engineered into a variety of specialized forms to better serve humanity. After nine million years of tweaking, most of them are not too bright but they are perfect at what they do. Ambassador Drill is trying to prevent a newly discovered species, the Shar, from treading on the toes of humanity, because if…

> Google's desire for scale, scale, scale, meant that interactions must be handled through The Algorithms

That's fine when you're a plucky growth startup. Less fine when you run half the internet.

If Google doesn't want to admit it's a mature business and pivot into margin-eating, but risk-reducing support staffing, then okay: break it back up into enough startup-sized chunks that the response failure of one isn't an existential threat to everyone.

Re: Google Safe Browsing can kill a startup

#249
post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In this case they do not provide a service to the OP. There is no agreement between OP and Google. This is happening on browsers of their customers. And I'm quite sure that if Google hits a company that competes with Google services there must be a law that they will be breaking. There was a big case in Poland where Google blocked a SaaS web shop provider using the same exact mechanism [0]. Polish courts decided that…

Aside from abusive dominent position there is no law they would break. When you download and use chrome you ACCEPT the Terms and Conditions of Google. There is no law that prevents a web browser from blocking access to a website or modifying the page . If the TOS stipulate « pages may differ from the original or be subject to third party software » , they are in within their rights and the customer accepted it when h…

I'm not a US citizen, but just 5 min of scanning US laws makes me think that there are basis for a lawsuit.

Essential facilities doctrine seems to be appropriate: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Essential_facilities_doctrine

Re: Google Safe Browsing can kill a startup

#250
post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Author here. I blocked the message in the screenshot because I narrated the first incident, but took screenshots during the second one, so the redacted part was referencing the first one in which, as described, our domain was cleared without actually doing anything. Protecting end users from nothing at all (like I said, there is no offending URL) is not more important than making sure Google doesn't literally gatekee…

I guess. Odds are that there was something , and you have every reason to state otherwise. You're really focused on the URL, but a whole domain will be tagged when random queries are met with content dispositions with malware, which can be automatically flagged by the search engine. As an aside, your commentary about Google alerting to phishing emails seems like you're misunderstanding and trying to use this to furth…

I am not misunderstanding anything, the fact that Google's own legitimate emails are flagged as phishing by their own filters is pretty telling about the reliability of the whole thing. The fact that you can come up with a plausible explanation to why it happened doesn't make it any less damning.

But of course, they don't flag google.com as a spammy domain and stop all emails coming from it, right?

PS: Im not sure exactly what you are disputing. Are you suggesting their report pointed to a smoking gun on my site, and I'm lying? My experience is not unique. There are plenty of instances of the same type of issue affecting other people in the very comments you are reading.

Post reply on HN