Update: Google search back to normal after hour long outage

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Update: Google Search seems to be back to normal, the issue was caused by "human error" according to Google.

Google Search is currently not functioning correctly and returning "this site may harm your computer" on every search link.

If you search for BBC News you will get the following:

And if you attempt to visit any search results you will be met with

"Warning - visiting this web site may harm your computer!
Suggestions:

* Return to the previous page and pick another result.
* Try another search to find what you're looking for.

Or you can continue to http://news.bbc.co.uk/ at your own risk. For detailed information about the problems we found, visit Google's Safe Browsing diagnostic page for this site.

For more information about how to protect yourself from harmful software online, you can visit StopBadware.org.

If you are the owner of this web site, you can request a review of your site using Google's Webmaster Tools. More information about the review process is available in Google's Webmaster Help Center."

At the time of writing Google representatives were unavailable for comment.

#1 SojIrOu on 31 Jan 2009 - 14:53

no wonder i kept getting this when i was trying to search on carrying laptop batteries in my luggage. ah well yahoo search it is then.

#2 garthfluff on 31 Jan 2009 - 14:55

Just about to start a thread on this. Hope it gets sorted soon.

#3 Howard on 31 Jan 2009 - 14:56

Yeah I just noticed that. Weird.

#4 Cryton on 31 Jan 2009 - 14:57

Someone's gonna get their legs slapped for this..

#5 tinyman on 31 Jan 2009 - 14:57

I thought I was going crazy for a second there....

Hope its fixed soon

#6 +lcg on 31 Jan 2009 - 14:58

I noticed this too. It's surprising that it still isn't fixed. You would think Google would fix it almost instantly.

(1 reply) #7 McK on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:00

Fail

Hope they fix it soon as possible, the longer it stays like this the more people will find out.

#7.1 BGM on 31 Jan 2009 - 17:04

well i saw it, didn't think anything off it and shrugged it off as 'odd'

the longer news reports like this are posted the more people will find out retrospectively

post some real news

#8 dbam987 on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:00

lol, guess it's back to windows live search for me!

#9 [a] on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:01

Other search engines will be noticing an increase in their usage for the next few hours or so I'm guessing :p

(1 reply) #10 Cøbra on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:01

Why isn't this showing in the Neowin (Main) RSS yet?

#10.1 Tom W on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:03

RSS gets updated every 15-30 mins, you can ping manually here

http://www.feedburner.com/fb/a/ping

(3 replies) #11 +Cy Bones on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:02

Seems to be fixed now...

EDIT: Cancel that, still errors.

#11.1 Tom W on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:04

Not for me

#11.2 iLinK on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:05

Cy Bones said,

Nope. Just did a search on "google" and still the same xD

#11.3 +s.L.m on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:23

fix'd here

#12 mimorqleko on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:02

wow!! I just realized how dependant I'm on google... Yahoo seems hard to use. =S

#13 mimorqleko on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:04

this means that GOOGLE GOT OWNED???

#14 RebelSean on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:06

On a side note, every e-mail in my Gmail inbox is currently saying:

Warning: This message may not be from whom it claims to be. Beware of following any links in it or of providing the sender with any personal information. Learn more

#15 +Techno_Funky on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:07

Holy Roaches with 89 legs and I was wondering what was going on. Hit right here and bang this is front page news.
Till then Yeah Yahoo it is.

#16 DOOOMKULTUS on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:07

Just started encountering this as well.man Google messed up big time.
My prediction is outsourcing guys are going to have a even bigger nervous moment,they depend on Google like god ,lol this is funny.

#17 sbrads on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:10

Blimey, thought ny PC had been hacked or something despite passing 2 AV scans earlier today. Back to AltaVista, Hotbot and/or Clusty for now.

#18 DOOOMKULTUS on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:14

oh how MS ,yahoo and the rest are going to laugh it up.So only way to defeat Google is by Google it itself.Hahaha i am enjoying every moment if it.Although i use Google myself :|

#19 +lcg on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:15

It's fixed now.

~~EDIT: For me, it either shows "This site may harm your computer." or it doesn't, whenever you search.~~

Last edited by lcg on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:22

#20 peachey on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:15

This isn't a issue with google per-say, they use a service called StopBadWare <www.stopbadware.org> which is currently down, which they [google] have interwoven into their system so much you can't simply press a button to turn it off.

The StopBadWare organization is run by the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School, and Oxford University's Oxford Internet Institute. Support is being provided by Google, Mozilla, Lenovo, PayPal, VeriSign, and Sun Microsystems.

#21 miguel_montes on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:20

Seems to be fixed, now.

#22 DOOOMKULTUS on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:20

yep fixed

(1 reply) #23 +lcg on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:22

Yeah, it's fixed now

#23.1 +Techno_Funky on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:24

Yeps ,seems to be fixed now.

#24 LTD on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:23

Works just fine now/

#25 Brendon on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:24

It's been like this since about 14:39. Would have though it would be fixed by now.

http://www.making-the-web.com/2009/01/31/g...stops-searches/

EDIT: Working fine now...

(2 replies) #26 +s.L.m on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:24

damn that's why I like neowin ^^ !!

couldn't find any news about this but here

#26.1 Imran Hussain on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:36

lol! it's ALL over the Internet, not just Neowin.

#26.2 +s.L.m on 31 Jan 2009 - 16:29

lol, maybe now it's all over the internet,

#27 Cøbra on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:26

I'm guessing either some n00b at Google entered an empty string into their "harmful" filter system, or someone managed to hack their way into that part of the system and add a wildcard, thus tagging everything as harmful.

(4 replies) #28 Imran Hussain on 31 Jan 2009 - 15:36

Weird, TechCrunch reports that it lasted 15 minutes. What's the correct duration?

#28.1 KavazovAngel on 31 Jan 2009 - 16:01

Maybe it was region-related?

#28.2 darkpuma on 31 Jan 2009 - 16:28

KavazovAngel said,

no, and it was at least 30 because i checked

#28.3 Tikitiki on 31 Jan 2009 - 19:06

It varies. Because of the way google's infrastructure works, changes are staggered throughout the servers. 15 minutes was probably the low end for people.

#28.4 Tom W on 31 Jan 2009 - 19:08

TechCrunch is wrong, it lasted close to 1hr. Google had admitted that on their blog.

(1 reply) #29 +chorpeac on 31 Jan 2009 - 16:31

hahaha my mom was trying to see her Hotmail on my computer, and she was asking why this was happening. I was like....that's weird, what did you do to my computer MA? hahaha

#29.1 Pumi on 31 Jan 2009 - 17:06

lol

(1 reply) #30 +StevoFC on 31 Jan 2009 - 17:22

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/01/thi...omputer-on.html

#30.1 Tikitiki on 31 Jan 2009 - 17:27

StevoFC said,

Ouch. Don't they have offline SQA servers to test changes before they go life? This should've been spotted easily.

#31 Quikboy on 31 Jan 2009 - 20:21

Even Google makes mistakes

Good thing I have a back-up search service; Live Search.

#32 solardog on 31 Jan 2009 - 20:23

Bush's fault

#33 ThaCrip on 31 Jan 2009 - 21:36

i noticed it earlier to but it did not last long before it was back to normal.

#34 thejohnnyq on 31 Jan 2009 - 22:54

It was return results last night like that, when i was searching on Burn Notice, and the In memory of jose duarte, and ignored the message, and the site attempted to install antivirus 2009 on my system. I tried a few more, but it was return it for all. The way to fix it was to registered your domain and place either a google meta tag or page for them, it took the warning away for the sites that i have.

#35 liemfukliang on 01 Feb 2009 - 01:44

I see. No wonder yesterday when I was looking the lcd spek, all google result that I click was pointing to a same warning. Since the website was unknowned to me, I still think google is fine. Until I go to official Samsung page. The Samsung page was also get the same warning. That time I was little suspect that something wrong with Google. This morning when I read this news, I am write about the whole things.

#36 Justin- on 01 Feb 2009 - 01:55

The current headline on Drudge Report is hilarious: "GOOGLE GOES MAD: TAGS REST OF INTERNET 'HARMFUL'"

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