phranque - 10:51 am on Apr 27, 2007 (gmt 0)

from pc world [pcworld.com]:

Google could avoid future malware attacks carried out using advertisements posted on its Web sites if the company more thoroughly investigated customers of its AdWords system, according to security and legal experts. On April 25, researchers with security software maker Exploit Prevention Labs announced that they had uncovered hard evidence that malware distributors were using advertisements placed via Google's automated AdWords system to infect unsuspecting end-users with virus code. According to Roger Thompson, chief technology officer at Exploit, based in New Kingstown, Pa., the malware brokers used fraudulent advertisements for legitimate organizations such as the Better Business Bureau to trick users into clicking on the links. When someone clicked such a link, the ad would redirect their browser through URLs that attempted to automatically download virus programs onto their computers before passing them along to the actual sites that were advertised.