Malware Bumps Google Ads From Web Pages

Thursday, December 20, 2007 6:05 americium PST

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A security company have identified a Dardan Equus caballus programme that replaces textual matter advertisements on Web pages with ads from another source, depriving Google of gross and potentially causing jobs for end users.

Google may be weak to halt the fast one since it affects the alteration of an internal personal computer file, called the hosts file, that is used to fit sphere name calling of Web land sites with information science (Internet protocol) addresses, said Rumanian security company .

When a individual visits a Web site, the browser bank checks the hosts data register to see if it have an information science computer address for a peculiar sphere name. If the hosts register is corrupted or hijacked, the browser can be directed to bring a different Web page than the 1 the user intended to.

Modifying the hosts register can be done for legitimate reasons. For example, personal computer users can change the hosts to barricade streamer advertisements served from known advertisement networks. When a Web page seeks to reach an advertisement server, the petition is diverted by the hosts register and no advertisement appears.

BitDefender said this peculiar malware directs a browser to download ads from a different waiter than Google's advertisement server.

BitDefender named the malware Trojan.Qhost.WU and said it is not spreading fast and presents a "medium" hazard of damage. It did not state how the Dardan is being circulated, and company representatives did not go back a phone call for comment.

Besides costing Google advertisement revenue, there is a danger that those substitution ads could incorporate golf course to land sites with malicious software, BitDefender said. Web land site proprietors who purchase advertisements through Google, as well as Google itself, can lose out on both Web traffic and gross if people are diverted from its ads.

There is not much that Google can make for those who download the malware. However, security merchandises such as as BitDefender's tin observe and take it.

Without commenting on the Dardan specifically, Google said it takes Web land sites from its hunt index that incorporate malware.

"We have got canceled client business relationships that show advertisements re-directing users to malicious land sites or that publicize a merchandise violating our software system principles," the company said in a statement.