Right here’s find out how 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 infinite expanse of the web? What a foolish query, proper? It might have been simply moments in the past and maybe it’s even the way you landed on this blogpost.
Others looking out on-line, nevertheless, could encounter much less favorable outcomes. How so? Our behavior of blindly trusting and clicking on high search outcomes has grow to be so predictable that it may be subverted and turned towards us.
Rigging the sport
Cautionary examples aren’t onerous to come back by, and I recall one that’s too quirky to not point out: some Australians who not too long ago looked for one thing as innocuous because the legality of Bengal cats within the nation didn’t obtain easy info on pet rules; as an alternative, they unwittingly ran the chance of having their knowledge stolen following a sequence of occasions that began with a click on on a high search engine outcome.
However even if you happen to’re not a cat fancier, it is best to know that even a easy search question could breed hassle. Some cybercriminals have for years been utilizing strategies that may push malicious web sites dressed as much as look legit into the highest of individuals’s search outcomes, usually leveraging both search engine marketing poisoning (also referred to as black hat search engine marketing) or, much more generally, malicious search adverts.
One subtle instance of ‘search engine marketing 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 fame of the web sites it compromises. Comparable campaigns have 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 regarded similar to these of common software program, corresponding to Firefox, WhatsApp, or Telegram. The tip aim was to achieve full management of the compromised units.
The dangers aren’t misplaced on Google, after all. In keeping with its newest Advertisements Security 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, almost double from the earlier 12 months.”
Some threats nonetheless slip by means of, nevertheless. Which is why it pays to know in regards to the dangers concerned in each natural and paid search outcomes, and find out how to separate the wheat from the chaff.
Hidden in plain sight
The current meteoric rise of AI instruments, for one, has created new searching 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 location beneath displayed logos of precise OpenAI companions, probably duping even many tech-savvy victims. A lot the identical factor occurred with different AI instruments, together with most not too long ago when DeepSeek burst onto the scene.
ESET researchers in Latin America not too long ago noticed a complicated marketing campaign that impersonated the La Veloz del Norte bus firm campaigns and focused Argentinians who seek for long-distance bus tickets. Vacationers who entered their info on the imposter web site unwittingly handed over each login credentials and banking particulars to cybercriminals.
Monetary companies signify notably high-value targets. In 2022, ESET researchers in Latin America alerted folks to scams impersonating Mastercard by means of adverts.
Staying protected
Most of all, keep in mind that prominence in search outcomes doesn’t mechanically equate to legitimacy. Additionally, likelihood is excessive that many individuals don’t all the time distinguish between natural outcomes and adverts, and criminals reap the benefits of this particularly by means of 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 so as to dupe the sufferer, as was the case right here with telegraem[.]org. Which is why it is best to keep away from blindly clicking on no matter seems on the high of your search web page. As an alternative, study the URLs meticulously and look out for any indicators that one thing is amiss. Apply the identical degree of scrutiny if you happen to’re utilizing Google’s AI search options, as scammers are continually evolving their strategies and discover new methods of selling web sites that push scams and malware.
Defend your digital accounts with robust and distinctive passwords or passphrases, in addition to with two-factor authentication. Use respected safety software program that may establish and block connections to malicious domains, thus offering an extra layer of safety towards misleading search outcomes.
Additionally, Google itself presents instruments to examine the outcomes, corresponding to accessing particulars by clicking the three dots adjoining to sponsored listings, which might expose discrepancies between claims and the true id. When you suspect that you have encountered a dodgy web site, you’ll be able to report it to Google.
Conclusion
We’ve all executed it 1,000,000 occasions: typed a question, scanned outcomes, clicked on one in every of them, ‘obtained 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 wherever any time quickly. Previous habits die onerous, and the dangers aren’t going wherever, both. Search fastidiously.
