Searchland Security Advisory High

If you haven’t gotten around to updating your anti-virus software and/or installed the newest Windows update patches the time is now! In the last few weeks our users have reported 3 times the normal number of malware attempts.

One new approach is to bomb search engines with malware sites. Google and others have been cleaning up their results as quickly as possible but it’s an ongoing battle.

HEADS UP: More Google poising on the way? SunbeltBLOG

If you think the search engines are in the business of filtering out the bad guys you would be wrong. Even some paid advertising was recently found to send folks to malware sites. They do their best to keep you safe but that’s not really their responsibility.

The bottom line is you need to take steps to stay safe. Here are just a few timely tips.

• Update Windows
  One of the most common entries into your system is a well known vulnerability you’ll see referred to the IFRAME exploit. Microsoft has corrected this problem and as long as you’ve installed all the Windows Update patches you’re better off.


• Don’t download that CODEC
  A popular trick to get users to download files is to make you think it’s required. It doesn’t have to be a video of a naked Brittney. It could be a video of a cute kitty but if it says, you must install this codec before viewing the video, STOP.


• Your computer is not a “potential Spyware operation”.
  Don’t fall for a pop up that says your computer is infected. Even if this is true any web page that detects this without you asking is a scam. You’ll end up with is Rogue Anti-Spyware software which will exhort a payment from you before giving you control of your own computer. If you want security software go with a known company.


• Disconnect your computer at night. (New)
  Turning off your computer at night has long been debated within the computer industry and I won’t get into it now. I will advise at the least, disconnect your computer from the Internet when not in use. Even if you think your computer is clean you could may infected and your computer could act as a “bot”. You’re also at risk to be infected by some vulnerability like MSBlaster that hasn’t been made public yet. If everyone got in the habit of turning off the internet when not in use it couldn’t hurt.

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Yahoo! Surprises Me with Improved Search

Three months ago I spent some time researching the major search engines and concluded that Google remained the best search engine available. (More Info). Recent ratings have also showed that Google leads business of Internet searches. Yahoo! Inc has announced new search enhancements including something called “Search Assistant”.

Press Release…

"The new Yahoo! Search is focused on getting consumers the most relevant information as well as providing the best user experience. We know that consumers want a complete answer, not a bunch of links, and the changes we've made are focused on getting people to the best answer -- whether it be a Web link, photo, video or music clip -- in one search," said Vish Makhijani, general manager and senior vice president of Yahoo! Search.

Unlike Ask.com who tried to lure new users with an expensive ad campaign about its algorithm, Yahoo! actually improved their search engine. Using my traditional “Pytlovany” search test the results from Yahoo! improved since early summer and now exceed the results from Google. For now, my testing is preliminary and I have found at least one invalid result but this appears to be a big step for Yahoo!

I’m not sure if Yahoo! has raised the bar on search technology but they appear to have grabbed onto it. This should cause the folks at Google to focus a little more on enhancing their search advantage. While both companies have diverse offerings, search is still the entry point to their business. I expect we’ll be hearing more about the “Search Wars” in the future.

Update: A little more research shows that Yahoo! may have put the cart before the horse on their new search technology. I found that while they may have increased their search results, Yahoo! fails to properly screen out some potentially dangerous sites. While my Safe Search options were set to “Filter out adult Web, video, and image search results” it didn’t work. I was sent to a couple sites with porngraphic videos asking me to download ActiveX files to view the video.

While some make argue this is not their responsibility safe searching is one enhancement even Google could improve on.

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Google is still #1, Ask.com Fails Test

There has been a lot of talk these days about new search company's taking on Google and trying to take some of their traffic away. Ask.com created an aggressive multi-million dollar ad campaign claiming they have a better algorithm for searches. In the SF Bay area, the highways have been littered with billboards that say “The Algorithm Killed Jeeves.” TV commercials paint Google as an evil information monopoly with Ask.com being an underground savior.

According to a new study this month by Hitwise, Google is still king of the search with 64.13% of the traffic. Yahoo followed with 21.26% and MSN with 9.15%. Ask.com came in 4th with 3.48% While is data shows where people are searching it doesn't say who is best.

To find out who is best, I use the "Pytlovany Test". Having a unique last name I've found it to be a good keyword to find out who has the best search bots and methodology. A search on "Pytlovany" on most search engines will usually find a number of references to me and my family and not much else.

Google not only returns the most results, but the topics that show up first are relevant and timely. Currently, the first result is this Blog which makes sense since it's updated regularly. It probably doesn't hurt that my Blog is hosted by Google. I haven't looked at all the results but they claim to find over 9000 references. This number includes non-English web pages.

Yahoo returns about 1200 hits and seems to like my LinkedIn profile. Bits from Bill is listed 4th and other results are all very relevant to anyone searching on Pytlovany.

MSN or Live Search returns over 1800 hits with this Blog at the top and nicely spreads out the results with other family members and their pages.

Ask.com returned less than a thousand sites but the results were the most annoying. On the top of their list is a link to the "Pytlovany Surname Resource Center". This is a genealogy page created to attract search traffic by listing every name they can find. It has no meaning to anyone searching and should not be included.

These days a lot of content is stolen and copied to adware sites so even the Pytlovany name isn’t safe . I decided to look more carefully at the first 5 pages of results to see how accurate the search was. I was pretty happy with what I found. Most sites listed references to myself and family members.

The only failure was to Ask.com. In the first 50 sites returned, 8 were bogus genealogy sites, surname databases, and others looking to get my attention instead of providing results. I admit, I wasn’t a fan of Ask.com and their Toolbar/Zwinky stuff but my test doesn’t lie. It will be interesting to see if spending millions of dollars promoting their poor technology will calculate into more users.

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