Here’s the right way to keep away from being hit by fraudulent web sites that scammers can catapult on to the highest of your search outcomes
10 Apr 2025
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4 min. learn
When was the final time you looked for one thing utilizing Google Search, Bing or one other gateway to the limitless expanse of the web? What a foolish query, proper? It could have been simply moments in the past and maybe it’s even the way you landed on this blogpost.
Others looking on-line, nonetheless, could encounter much less favorable outcomes. How so? Our behavior of blindly trusting and clicking on high search outcomes has develop into so predictable that it may be subverted and turned in opposition to us.
Rigging the sport
Cautionary examples aren’t laborious to come back by, and I recall one that’s too quirky to not point out: some Australians who just lately looked for one thing as innocuous because the legality of Bengal cats within the nation didn’t obtain easy data on pet rules; as an alternative, they unwittingly ran the chance of having their knowledge stolen following a series of occasions that began with a click on on a high search engine end result.
But even for those who’re not a cat fancier, it’s best to know that even a easy search question could breed bother. Some cybercriminals have for years been utilizing methods that may push malicious web sites dressed as much as look legit into the highest of individuals’s search outcomes, sometimes leveraging both website positioning poisoning (also referred to as black hat website positioning) or, much more generally, malicious search adverts.
One subtle instance of ‘website positioning fraud as a service’ was uncovered by ESET researchers in 2021 after they discovered a beforehand undocumented server-side trojan that manipulated search engine outcomes by hijacking the status of the web sites it compromises. Similar campaigns had been noticed once more simply weeks in the past.
In one other instance, ESET researchers recognized a marketing campaign that deployed adverts in Google search outcomes main victims to phony web sites that seemed equivalent to these of fashionable software program, equivalent to Firefox, WhatsApp, or Telegram. The finish aim was to realize full management of the compromised units.
The dangers aren’t misplaced on Google, after all. According to its newest Ads Safety Report, in 2023 the corporate “blocked or eliminated over 5.5 billion adverts, barely up from the prior 12 months, and suspended 12.7 million advertiser accounts, practically double from the earlier 12 months.”
Some threats nonetheless slip via, nonetheless. Which is why it pays to know concerning the dangers concerned in each natural and paid search outcomes, and the right way to separate the wheat from the chaff.
Hidden in plain sight
The latest meteoric rise of AI instruments, for one, has created new looking grounds for scammers, sparking schemes the place fraudsters purchased adverts for counterfeit ChatGPT websites that redirected folks to web sites harvesting bank card particulars. The web site under displayed logos of precise OpenAI companions, probably duping even many tech-savvy victims. Much the identical factor occurred with different AI instruments, together with most just lately when DeepSeek burst onto the scene.
ESET researchers in Latin America just lately noticed a classy marketing campaign that impersonated the La Veloz del Norte bus firm campaigns and focused Argentinians who seek for long-distance bus tickets. Travelers who entered their data on the imposter web site unwittingly handed over each login credentials and banking particulars to cybercriminals.
Financial providers characterize significantly high-value targets. In 2022, ESET researchers in Latin America alerted folks to scams impersonating Mastercard via adverts.
Staying protected
Most of all, keep in mind that prominence in search outcomes doesn’t mechanically equate to legitimacy. Also, chances are high excessive that many individuals don’t all the time distinguish between natural outcomes and adverts, and criminals reap the benefits of this particularly via malvertising campaigns aimed toward individuals who, for instance, seek for software program.
In some circumstances, fraudsters could register a typosquatting or similar-looking top-level area to that of the software program writer as a way to dupe the sufferer, as was the case right here with telegraem[.]org. Which is why it’s best to keep away from blindly clicking on no matter seems on the high of your search web page. Instead, look at the URLs meticulously and look out for any indicators that one thing is amiss. Apply the identical degree of scrutiny for those who’re utilizing Google’s AI search options, as scammers are consistently evolving their strategies and discover new methods of selling web sites that push scams and malware.
Protect your digital accounts with sturdy and distinctive passwords or passphrases, in addition to with two-factor authentication. Use respected safety software program that may determine and block connections to malicious domains, thus offering a further layer of safety in opposition to misleading search outcomes.
Also, Google itself presents instruments to examine the outcomes, equivalent to accessing particulars by clicking the three dots adjoining to sponsored listings, which might expose discrepancies between claims and the true identification. If you believe you studied that you have encountered a dodgy web site, you may report it to Google.
Conclusion
We’ve all completed it one million occasions: typed a question, scanned outcomes, clicked on one among them, ‘got our fill’, and moved on. And though basic search engines like google and yahoo more and more compete with the likes of ChatGPT and AI-generated search summaries, the basic search-and-click routine is unlikely to go anyplace any time quickly. Old habits die laborious, and the dangers aren’t going anyplace, both. Search fastidiously.