How many times have you gotten conned into thinking that your Online malware protection software needed an update? Or that your registry files were corrupted? Only to find that those “warnings” were essentially fake adverts.
Well, now, thanks to a concentrated effort by Google, such back-door ads, or as Google search has put it, “social engineering attacks”, may soon die down.
As part of its “safe browsing” policy, Google had, in November, announced that this new program would protect surfers from social engineering attacks – deceptive tactics that try to trick you into doing something dangerous, like installing unwanted software or revealing your personal information (for example, passwords, phone numbers, or credit cards). Today, the search major announced it was expanding ‘Safe Browsing’ protection to protect users from such deceptive embedded Content like social engineering ads.
Many of our readers, like we said, may have already encountered social engineering in a deceptive download button, or an image ad that falsely claims your system is out of date. See this image:
The Google Safe Browsing Team has now warned in a blog post that if visitors to a Website consistently saw such social engineering Content, it would issue warnings to visitors. If your Site gets flagged, you should troubleshoot with Search Console. Here’s a link.
So what exactly constitutes a social engineering ad?
- Pretend to act, or look & feel, like a trusted entity — like your own device or browser, or the Website itself
- Try to trick you into doing something you’d only do for a trusted entity — like sharing a password or calling tech support
So, perhaps, the last days are here for such deceptive ads we see Online?
Image Credit: Google Online Security
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