Yet another reason to tell your parents to buy iphones.
This is a twofold benefit for the sleezy company: Google gets paid directly by malware developers, and the added malware on people's computers helps drive consumers to switch to Chromebooks. The "rampant malware on Windows" problem is largely a Google creation, and of course, Google advocates their product as the solution.
I clicked both results for "flash player" and nothing on my computer (Mac) or in the browser (Chrome) warned me, whereas I have received warnings on other sites for "phishing attempts". I never would have downloaded anything from those sites, but my parents sure would have.
Who knows, if I were in a hurry and it was a program I wasn't familiar with or that I was trying to get for free? And if the site was more polished or a full html/css clone of the real site? It honestly might have worked on me.
What kind of malware do these bogus paid results contain? What would have happened if I'd installed them? What can you do to defend against that besides being a savvy web user?
Thanks for this. I learned something.
How is making it easier for developers to distribute apps on the open web "malware + cash"? It's more like balancing the risk of malware against the benefits of openness and encouraging web app development.