Is Your Site Distributing Malware? Google Steps Up Its "Neighborhood Watch" Service
Has your site been distributing malicious software without your knowledge? Google's Webmaster Central is helping everyone keep the Internet a safer place by notifying webmasters of pages that it thinks might be bad.
The new more detailed notifications are posted to Webmaster Central and also emailed to webmasters. The notifications list sample URLs so that webmasters can more quickly zero in on the "badware" problems and fix them. Knowing your site is infected is helpful, but tracking it down can be a challenge, since badware can be passed by something as simple as inserting 1 pixel iframe that causes a download from a malicious site.
How is "badware" determined?
The guidelines are posted on the StopBadware.org.
What is badware?
Badware is software that fundamentally disregards a user's choice over how his or her computer will be used. There are several commonly recognized terms for types of badware - spyware, malware, and deceptive adware. Common examples might be a free screensaver that surreptitiously generates ads, or a malicious web browser toolbar that makes your browser go to different pages than the ones you expected. (StopBadware.org)
Tags: badware | security | webmasters
